Carina Mendonça created test tubes in the form of characters from social stereotypes born of her experience, or the watching world with attention and can see all this the House of Culture in Santana until November 11th.
Tell me about the concept of this exhibition "intubated".
Carina Mendonça: The exhibition focuses on their overall social degradation in the society where we live. It's a metaphor, is symbolic, because we live intubated, like tablets. It is a sub-system that guides, directs and determines our supposedly free acts, sometimes obscures our true self, our true identity. They are also psychic games that everyone does if they want to follow fashion, or not, but one way or another many are guided and here we are isolated. I did the paintings in tubes and the characters that we also represent a symbolism, they are in bottles, as an in vitro experiment, as guinea pigs.
Let's speak of the dolls within the jars, each of them is a character, but of what kind? How come? Offspring from people you see?
CM: I do not know, it depends, can be watching a movie, can be out of compassion, it is indifferent, I am very open to outside stimuli and everything interests me, I have these characters and the tubes were painted at a later stage, first came the dolls .
Are stereotypes in what sense?
CM: They represent social behavior, inhibitions, I remember miss Bruna is a string doll, she knows she has to go to work because it fits where she was born, raised and that was instilled, she knows to belong and fit is how it has to be. Sometimes we are grown up with these messages that are past on and have them as real without even questioning us, without even thinking that there are other possibilities, or other forms of living. Birdie "Tweety yellow" looks upon the human and say, "oh, my god, what madness, those creatures are so strange" because it does not belong to our species and it's funny.
How you make the dolls? I know you're self-taught.
CM: The dolls are made from fabric and I paint them with acrylic, the filling in the dolls is also fabric, is all recycled material such as the notebooks that I already do for some time.
But they are very stylized.
CM: Yes, is not the typical cuddly rag doll, there is enough compression. I spend eight to ten hours to make a doll from the cut squares to fill with tissue takes time, but it's rewarding, I like the final process.
How then appears the CM art work?
CM: The name appears in London when I started doing fairs, they demanded a logo with a certain aesthetic, but I usually say my logo is less creative part of my job. I started working with the dolls and notebooks, but differentiate the paint, do not know if I was right or wrong, are different works, the canvas are artistic works with a very unique design, but it is so since 2010.
And the markets?
CM: Yes, in Greenwich.
Of crafts?
CM: And art. When I'm ask if I am a craftswoman I feel uncomfortable, because we have the idea of handicrafts be a repetitive art, although the pieces are not quite identical, will not be the same, but will be quite similar. My works are unique pieces, have enough care in making them so.
So the characters you are not repeated, nor equal.
CM: Yes, I can do two characters who have a big heart, who love to be alive, but all messages will be different, the stimulus will never be the same. I think the hardest was to make two equal, the "Ink John" is a character who loves art and he is in no way creative and the way he found to deal with this is to have the whole body tattooed, it leads to art with it, it's not right or wrong, it is the way of it.
You describe your dolls like the stereotypes, yet I do not think that. They are even people who suffer from been prejudiced.
CM: Bruna is a workaolic is a stereotype, but that labeling is also difficult, I can find people who are compulsive with their routine and that does not make them feel good, but makes them feel better others see them match expectations.
Do you have a character that you keep close to your heart?
CM: Let me think, I have many that I do not have with me. I was very fond of Maurice was French and for some reason he did not have an arm and in another hand was a flower and his message said "Who need two arms when we only need one hand to give you a flower." In the exhibition I have Lana is gay and she says what life she seeks in the real world, "what fills my heart is life, if they find difficult to understand I'm gonna say something to explain what I feel, not all Chinese like rice. " They are all very natural.
You have difficulty disposing of them yourself?
CM: Yes a lot, but I'm better now, because before people said the dolls were so cute, but you never believe much that someone will buy them and sometimes I find myself sad, because I did it last night, had just fill it in, put the message and already lost it or had any time to played a little with my character. I still have this very strong inner child, I like to play with my dolls.
