Alícia Casadesús IN RESIDENCE at Jaume Balmes secondary school
With the participation of Antoni Clapés

To kick off the process, Alícia Casadesús and Antoni Clapés sent a letter to the pupils to introduce themselves. This idea about correspondence led to the construction of several letter boxes for sharing thoughts during the course. The letter also introduced the idea of the journey, and postcards are made to describe journeys from home to the school.

Transversally throughout the course, and as a way of starting and warming up each session, the first ten minutes were devoted to working on a 14 cm x 14 cm sheet of paper. This regular experimental exercise enabled the pupils to change mindset for the session whilst also giving them the chance to work with materials that were gradually introduced.

Another transversal activity, included in several sessions, were exercises in perception: sessions on the roof for drawing with the eyes closed, taking rubbings of surfaces at the school, walking around with a mirror in the middle of the face... Different experiences to awaken the pupils’ perception and gaze… The seismograph was one of these exercises that ended up playing a central role in the process, forming part of the final pieces.

Writing was an important element throughout the residence and at various times writing was linked to visual creation. For the postcards, Antoni Clapés introduced the haiku and devoted several sessions to writing. Worked centred on the idea of place, everybody’s place... The process culminated with a series of short poems.

Microgrames, a work created jointly by Alícia Casadesús and Antoni Clapés, was an important reference point in the process. That is why several sessions were devoted to discovering the project, watching the filmed pieces and learning more about the world of creative art, and the materials and the works she had made... A visual reference that ended up giving great impetus for the final piece.

At several times during the course, the large desk in the classroom became an important element. This was the space for speaking as a whole group, sharing experiences and thoughts together. At one of these moments, the pupils were invited to write about the creative process that had begun. The pupils’ texts were full of thought and energy, and also ended up forming part of the room notes at the final exhibition.

To enable the group to become familiar with the Casa Elizalde exhibition room and gradually strengthen the links between the group and this community centre, a guided tour of the new temporary exhibition was organised, in this case a solo show by Teresa Mulet, accompanied by the artist herself. This enabled the group to discover a very different show from the one they had visited previously, while also entering the artist's creative universe through here work. The pupils had previously visited the space on their to see the temporary exhibition Com una cadira [Like a Chair] as part of an assignment set by Alícia Casadesús.

After some thoughts about materials, Alícia presented a material found in many of her works: thread connects places, objects and so on. A session was devoted to using this material at the school and in other places, observing the effect it causes and what happens. 

A short exercise that took place before the end of the second term was that of describing each person’s place in a box. Linked to the texts that they had written, the pupils tried to find materials, forms and arrangements to express this place through art. Their work was shared with the group on the last day of term.

Place, journeys, routes… these were the themes of the residence. From among the various experimental ideas, work continued with the seismograph and the group finally decided to make one of the pieces using this method. Each pupil attached paper to frames to make the base for their work. The process involved a morning devoted to soaking the papers, placing them over the wooden frames, tensing them and attaching them with clips. The sizes of the frames were fixed in order to create a mosaic from the twenty pieces, one by each pupil and a last one by the artists in residence.

The seismograph was conducted at the school and surrounding area by small groups of pupils who passed the line on the canvas to each other. Each pupil added a few words and cuttings from small photos reflecting points during the course or references to the creative process. 

The group finally decided to choose an object that explains the place of each, threading them together to create a joint, shared place. This work culminated in the process of making the pieces, which were linked together using white thread.

The 14 x 14 sheets of paper, the texts, the personal works… It was decided to bind all this together using a Japanese technique. The bookbinder Begoña Cabero was invited to a session at which she showed the pupils how to bind books. The pupils had previously threaded the covers of the pieces together using some identifying element.

The idea of place is a central concept in the work of Alícia Casadesús, and her place is the village of L'Esquirol and the cliffs of Collsacabra. To enable her to share this with the rest of the group, a visit was organised to her studio and the locations of de Microgrames, the work that this artist created in cooperation with Antoni Clapés. On the trip, the pupils were accompanied by family members.

To more visits to Casa Elizalde are organised in order to decide how to arranged the pieces in the exhibition room. During the first visit, the pupils measure the spaces and think about the sizes of the tables, the distribution of the pieces and the texts on the walls. At the second, by which time the tables and other elements were already in place, the group as a whole decided the distribution and formal organisation of the exhibition. 

Since writing and composing poetry was an important part of both the creative process and the final exhibition, the group decided that, after the final presentation, an event would also be organised to read the texts. According, besides the show, a short recital of the pupils’ texts and their thoughts over the course of the academic year were organised. On the day of the presentation, all the artist’s books were displayed on a table so that visitors could browse through them.