Matadero Madrid center for contemporary creation

EL CIELO ERA MÁS CLARO EN AQUELLOS DÍAS

Rosa Casado and Mike Brookes
Start date
End date
Timetable
8:30 pm
Format
Venue
Naves Matadero
Nave 11. Sala Fernando Arrabal
Institution
For ten days the artists Rosa Casado and Mike Brookes will dismantle each and every part of a second-hand car.
Frequently found in the most avant-garde international circuits for more than a decade now, Rosa Casado and Mike Brookes are two multidisciplinary artists who, through action, generate a proposal that involves reflection, creation and critique regarding the spaces and places we travel through, occupy and inhabit. They have been working together since 2000 and have produced more than a dozen projects that have been presented in Europe, America, Australia and Asia. Their work addresses conceptualism from a pragmatic point of view and they are interested in literality and the obvious as a resource for doing.

During their residency in Naves Matadero they have created El cielo era más claro en aquellos días, a project that begins with a small gesture: looking upwards. A slight inclination of the neck to lift up our gaze, to contemplate the sky and consider what lies beyond our horizon.

For ten days, in five different performance art pieces, they will dismantle each and every part of a second-hand car, a meticulous action of separation and classification of the materials that make up the vehicle.

“These materials, which come from many different geographical locations, some of them very far away, and which are concentrated in this object through processes that exceed the time and space of natural geological processes, make the car a geophysically improbable place. Through the gradual dismantling of the car, and considering human activity as a 'force of nature', an extraordinary and explosive force, every night we will reflect on different aspects of the planetary and cosmic dynamics of which we are all a part: from how our activity generates a constant cloud of small particles that rises densely towards the sky and moves through the air around the Earth, to how we are experiencing the sixth mass extinction of the planet. If the dinosaurs disappeared during the fifth mass extinction due to the impact of an asteroid, then we want to start considering that now, in this new era of the accelerated disappearance of life forms, we are the asteroid”, the artists explain.

Episode 1 [Sept 13] begins with the final journey of one of the 1 billion cars estimated to be currently driving around the streets of the world
Episode 2 [Sept 14] looks up at the thin layer of atmosphere that surrounds the planet, and at how the things it picks up and blows around us define what we see
Episode 3 [Sept 20] imagines the human population as a force of nature, and the scale of geological forces and events that might begin to mirror our own
Episode 4 [Sept 21] follows the dust that rises and settles from everything we do, and the remnants we all just pass on to our neighbours, and never escape
Episode 5 [Sept 22] collects everything that we might find a new use or purpose for, tries to give it away, and takes a look at what is left


Rosa Casado holds a PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies from the University of Glasgow and participates in various research and educational programmes and projects. Mike Brookes holds a PhD and is Artist-Researcher at the University of Aberystwyth in Wales, United Kingdom. His background lies in the plastic arts and his work crosses different media, such as painting, drawing, performance art, and text, among others. He has won several awards as a designer and stage director and his work is a benchmark in the field of performance art and contemporary performing arts in the UK.

Artists: Rosa Casado, Mike Brookes, Oscar García Villegas and other artists yet to be decided. 
Mechanic: Roberto Castro López
Production Terreno Común, an initiative of the Siemens Stiftung
Foundation in a co-production with Naves Matadero - International Living Arts Centre and NAVE (Chile) With the support of: Wales Arts International, The British Council in Chile and the Spanish Cultural Center in Chile
With the generous collaboration of: SE VENDE Mobile Platform of Contemporary Art Group (Chile), ESPAI COLONA (Chile) and Comarca Contuy (Chile)

WORLD PREMIERE



In collaboration with:

British Council

ACE Acción Cultural Española
wales art
Siemens Stiftung
cyngor wales art
lottery funded
EL CIELO ERA MÁS CLARO EN AQUELLOS DÍAS
Artistic team and specifications
Duracion
Five 1-hour episodes (one each day)