Carlos Amorales

CASA DE AMéRICA
Paseo de Recoletos 2
February 08–March 27

"Why fear the future?" is the titular question that animates this exhibition. By way of an answer, Carlos Amorales transformed his personal collection of four hundred-plus images—from his favorite childhood toy to a found crumpled poster of Osama bin Laden—into simple black and white vectorial drawings, as opposed to the familiar color pixels. After giving his "liquid archive" this more abstract and reduced form, Amorales used the images as a point of departure for three collaborations, which crystallised into video projections. Three Madrid Tarot readers interpret the fate dictated by the drawings, which Amorales has printed on playing cards; André Pahl adds red to the black and white palette with an animation that pits the artist's Dancing Devil against a storm of airplanes, monkeys, and shattered glass; finally, composer José Mariá Serralde adds a dramatic soundtrack, played by a lone pianist whose reflection is captured in the lacquer of an adjacent baby grand. Indeed, reflections—both the literal resemblances produced by the mirror and the figurative speculations delivered by the clairvoyant—are at the heart of this show. A video projection displaying Rorschach blots and an installation designed for a private fortune-telling seance underscore how the interpretation of images has been linked to personal fate. While perhaps poking fun at the art critic—yet another profane interpreter of images—Amorales suggests that images must become abstract before they can be used for individual ends, such as destiny, the psyche, or even taste. His liquid archive—a combination of appropriated images and intimate memories—is a carefully mixed potion from which we can all drink.

—Jennifer Allen