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  Solo Show
Lisbet Fernandez

Issue #54 Oct - Dec 2004
Institution:
Myto Gallery

Isaura Ruiz


Although relatively new on the local art scene, the Myto gallery has been offering exciting shows, such as Con los ojos abiertos, an exhibition of works by Cuban sculptor Lisbet Fernández (Camaguey, 1974.) The show presents five installations and some drawings that conceptually complement her work in sculpture.
Fernández’s installations comprise groups of small children in terra cotta, excellently executed in extremely detailed realism: their hair, the folds of their skin, their clothes and shoes, but above all, the force of their gaze.
The gaze of all the children in these sculptural groups is extremely forceful. Despite the fact that eyes are represented only by holes on the terra cotta piece the artist achieves a stirring intensity; these are defiant gazes that contrast with the initial impression of innocence once the viewer notices the figures are children.
The works are never naïve; the terra cotta suggests fragility, but the arrangement of the children, their interaction, and additional elements such as plastic umbrellas or old watches reaffirm the idea of provocation, as if the children wanted to play with those elements. However, we cannot speak of a playful intention on the part of the artist.
The show’s initial piece is Camina, and features a girl wearing boots, ruffled panties, and carrying a kind of walking stick. The expression on her face is demanding. The piece is complemented by a drawing done in the manner of a study or sketch for the work.
Across from this piece we encounter an even more disconcerting sculpture. It represents a boy looking at himself in a mirror, his head somewhat tilted; we see him from behind, and his face only appears as a reflection on the mirror. He has the same demanding gaze, although in this case the expression is somewhat melancholy, underscored by the fact that the boy seems to have been banished to a corner, as if someone had wanted to isolate him, although the mirror observes those who observe him.
Facing him there is an installation of three children with an equal number of transparent umbrellas, through which they gaze upon the word that surrounds them. Their expressions are of a certain befuddlement and fear.
In the next hall there is another installation of several children, all of them looking toward the viewer. As you enter, you feel the gazes of all those little ones. These are the same children in the same realistic detail, each with his or her own features, now with an examining gaze, in a way exchanging roles with the viewer, moving from observed to observer.
In the last hall we find Camino, an installation of two children leaning on an acrylic table; on the table there is a line of old watches arranged as if simulating a path. The children in this installation have clothes and shoes, and they have a fuller personality than the completely terra cotta children seen earlier. The girl even sports a red bow, and she seems to be asking for the viewer’s opinion about the path of watches, as if it is the children who show it to us.
The last piece in the exhibition is A partes iguales, a drawing of Velásquez’s Infanta Margarita re-signified by the artist, who divides the girl symmetrically with a vertical line so that one side presents her as she is known, with the magnificent dress and the stance of the Spanish royalty, while the other shows us the Infanta’s other extreme. She is deprived of her vestments and appears as human as possible, without pretension to elegance, she is simply a girl. These two extremes are highly contrasting and somewhat hark back to the idea of her sculpture, of children who do not hide anything, who give themselves to us in a complete way, with the decisiveness and the honesty that characterize childhood.
The work of Lisbet Fernández comes across as enigmatic, the material she used is already a personal mark, not only regarding the symbolism implied by the use of clay, but also in the expressiveness, the color that is like mestizo skin, and in a way represents a contradiction: despite its fragility the terra cotta tends is rigid, yet all of her children possess an organic force, a trapped vitality, an intensity that emanates from their gaze.
 


 

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