Jose Begega

Crystallize is an attempt at abstraction to understand where and in what way cities situate the “addict” in urban terms. In this project and in order to map them, Jose Begega draws on his situated knowledge of having been a user of different spaces dedicated to the “abuse” or handling of substances. His is a toxic look at the last underground station, wandering through the suburbs, turning a corner and coming across a semi-camouflaged door that leads to the health services. This project is a journey through the pleasure, grief, shame, trauma, pathologisation and stigma of several secondary characters

“ChemSex” is widely considered to be a marginal gay practice and a public health problem. As the term has become popular, all manner of people have come out of the woodwork: saviours, detractors and, above all, those who think they have brought it on themselves. When push comes to shove, even today the mechanisms of social control are designed to perpetuate the traditional family model. Through this project, Jose Begega suggests that we should rethink the use of substances, remove the stigma, but above all, question the model of social and health intervention in the event of their abuse. It is not hard to make a comparison with the social response to “AIDS” in the 1980s, which just goes to show that many of those phobias are still around today, even inside the trans-queer-dyke and LGTBQIA+ community. The use of “drugs” is still just a side effect that never played a major role in these movements. Information and awareness-raising to manage pleasures and to generate a strong and visible community are the ways that are gradually being generalised by organisations such as Apoyo Positivo, Stop SIDA, Imagina Más or Energy Control, heirs of health policies such as counselling (accompaniment) that were implemented by collectives such as ACT UP, Radical Gai or LSD

Jose Begega
His dubious and mutable identity means that his work, which at first sight may appear to be autobiographical, questions the notion of “reality”. In each project we can see how he illuminates a new part of his biography by caressing stigma. Jose Begega (Jose Ramón Alonso Díaz, Astroboi, Petia CerveraKrupova or Tom) is an Asturian artist who received a degree in Fine Arts from the Polytechnical University of Valencia, a Master’s Degree in Artistic Production and Investigation from the University of Barcelona. He is also a porn actor, a sex worker and a visual artist. He has presented his work at the Reina Sofía Museum, the etHall Gallery, the Palaciu de Ronzon, the Pumpk Festival, Cine Zumzeig, Espacio Nigredo, Injuve, Espositivo, Nau Estruch, Hangar, CanFelipa, La Usurpada, A Tomar por Culo Fest, Arts Santa Monica, Salamina, Kunstgebäude, Campo de Desconcentración Polivalente, Plaga, Liminal GR, TimeLab, Doméstica, Palma Photo'14, Pavilion Center Bucharest, Sala d'Art Jove and Roodkapje Rotterdam among others