Ojalá estuvieras aquí
Postcard edition, participatory action, artistic research, 2021.
An epistolary action designed as part of a residency at the Museo Reina Sofía as an outgrowth of Nemer’s artistic research into the dispersed postcard collection of French artist and author Hervé Guibert. The project, Quelques Corps Favorables, takes as its material starting point the postcards that appear in Guibert’s 1987 photograph Ma Bibliothèque. Nemer designed five postcards with the assistance of the museum. Each postcard traces a different relationship to the visual and affective worlds of Guibert’s life, writing, photography,and postcard collection while being shaped by Nemer’s experiences during his sojourn in Madrid. Images used for the postcards include a self-portrait by Alfonso Ponce de León; a video still by Andrés Senra, a notated page from a book by Vinciane Desprets, and diaristic photos from Nemer’s personal archive.
As a concluding gesture to his residency, Nemer shared the evolution of his research with a group of local artists, curators, researchers, and LGBTQ+ activists. Guests were invited to participate in his research through acts of elaboration: the postcards were distributed to attendees, who were asked to circulate them by sending them out into the world. Participants were invited to write to someone they knew, or someone they did not know. Someone living, or someone dead. Someone they had lost, someone who had lost them. Or to let the images live in the visual culture of their homes or libraries or other personal spaces.
As a concluding gesture to his residency, Nemer shared the evolution of his research with a group of local artists, curators, researchers, and LGBTQ+ activists. Guests were invited to participate in his research through acts of elaboration: the postcards were distributed to attendees, who were asked to circulate them by sending them out into the world. Participants were invited to write to someone they knew, or someone they did not know. Someone living, or someone dead. Someone they had lost, someone who had lost them. Or to let the images live in the visual culture of their homes or libraries or other personal spaces.
Photos by Ángela Losa & María Eugenia Serrano