Untitled (2023)
Seven colour analogue photographs
11.9 x 11.7 cm each
BA Collection
Inventory No.: 2023.567.7
Untitled consists of a set of seven analogue photographs from AI (artificial intelligence) images. The work is part of a project linked to anthropological research, identity, and collective memory. It consists of different installations related to the context that united the Basque and Icelandic peoples during the whale hunting period in the 17th century. Based on trade, the connection between the two cultures led to the formalisation of a proto-language – known as pidgin – between Basque and Icelandic. Consequently, there are three manuscripts containing glossaries, translations, and full sentences in Basque-Icelandic pidgin. Focusing on the use of this language, this project recreates the memories of a whaler of that time in the format of sensory traces using still images and audiovisual. Furthermore, the recreation of elements used as they plowed the seas are displayed using chattel and different installations associated with the very structure of the seafaring world. The project is fundamentally based on archives used from an instructional prism to reflect the identity of those peoples and the loss of the collective memory, while at the same time blurring the boundary between the imaginary and the truth.