Martín Vitaliti / Jorge Bravo – ethall - Site-Specific Conversation

First things first: when did you start to work together and how did you meet?

Jorge

I had just opened the gallery, and as you know, it was dedicated to drawings. When I was working on the statement and what direction to go in, I was in touch with Francesc Ruiz, who actually exhibited some work in the first season. It was Francesc who said to me, ‘I’ve told an artist I met to go and see you, to show you his work’, and that was Martín. It was when the gallery hadn’t been open for long, in 2011, and he brought me a few pieces I really liked. We decided straight away to put together the first exhibition. But Martín was off to Argentina for a few months, if I’m not mistaken. Right, Martín?

Martín

Was this in 2011? Yes.

Jorge

Yeah, and the first exhibition ended up being in 2012, because he was going to Argentina, so we decided to set a date for the exhibition when he got back.

Martín

Yes, I was going to Argentina. I’d been in Rio, at the Capacete residency. I think it was there, wasn’t it? I was in Argentina and then in Brazil. I left you some pieces before leaving.

Jorge

No, well, you didn’t leave them with me, you had to send them from Argentina. What happened was, before the first exhibition, I was invited to the second edition of JUSTMAD, when the fair was doing really well. The director was Giuletta Speranza. She called me at the last minute, perhaps because she had a free stand. To be honest, I’d never considered going to fairs, but she offered me this opportunity and I accepted. I took three artists there and asked Martín to send me some pieces from Argentina to show there. It was a bit of an odyssey, sending them from over there and making sure they arrived on time… But it was a huge success. He won the Museo ABC award. I sold everything for prices that make me tear my hair out now, because they were fantastic. And that was the first thing we did together

Martín, were you already aware of the gallery, then?

Martín

Yes, I’d been there once or twice… I think I saw the Nono Kadáver exhibition there.

Jorge

That was the first one.

Martín

I was walking by with Luz and we came into the gallery by coincidence. She told me, ‘You need to do an exhibition here, it’s a really cool place for it’. Of course, the connection with Francesc was through Luz, because she was much more involved in it all. I was working in other areas, in advertising. Francesc told me about his work with comics and I showed him my work, and it was then that he got in touch with Jorge.

You can tell you’ve been working together for a long time.

In your case, your professional relationship has led to a friendship.

Martín

Yeah, yeah. We’ve always got on well. We’ve never had any problems on a professional or friendship level.

Now, galleries are set up less like a commercial relationship between artist and gallerist and more like a personal relationship: a team working together, rather than a hierarchical relationship.

Jorge

I find it hard to view this as a hierarchical relationship or to think someone, a gallery, would see it that way. As a concept, it seems completely inappropriate, in the same way as those hierarchical relationships that take shape between gallerists and collectors. It’s something I would try to get rid of straight away, because they are relationships based on exchange, not between equals. Each party is in their field, but of course, there’s no hierarchy.
In my case, I really struggle to work with anyone not on the same wavelength, personally. Also because in this profession – as you know – very intimate things get jumbled up amongst the work of an artist and that of a gallerist… Or at least that’s how I view the profession. So, these relationships are always accompanied by respect, obviously, and by mutual understanding. And you build that mutual understanding by being on the same wavelength.
Then, of course, in some cases that relationship might be close, while in others, it’s less so. But there always needs to be that mutual understanding; otherwise, it won’t go anywhere, I think.
I also understand the gallerist’s job as being to accompany. Martín’s case is probably quite paradigmatic, because when we started to work together, he had a very defined, very attractive body of work, which had garnered a lot of success. And the decisions that had to be made from that moment on, regarding how to get established or otherwise, how to develop a career, or how to take the risks inherent in not settling, in exploring areas that would lead to as-yet-unknown destinations… That’s something we discussed a lot and continue to discuss today. Right, Martín?

Martín

Yes.

Did the change of space and programme influence you to explore installations more and to go beyond two dimensions, Martín? Or were you already thinking of doing that?

Martín

Yes, this evolution, in terms of the expansion that was happening in my work, is something that was on the cards. Perhaps Jorge’s new space did also encourage me to do something else. But the coordinates I was already following in terms of moving from two-dimensional to three-dimensional or spatial work were something that was latent in my work.

Jorge

You had already put together installations in other spaces before I moved galleries.

Martín

Yeah, I’d done it for the Composiciones programme as part of the 2017 Barcelona Gallery Weekend, and in Vienna… That type of invitation was more to do with the architectural space.

Jorge

And you did it in the Museo ABC… And that was 2013.

Martín

Yes, in La Panera too, in 2013. I was already quite open in terms of evolution in my work. But anyway, in Jorge’s new gallery space, I’ve only done one exhibition. The one coming up now is the second.

And for this one… Have you defined what you’re going to present yet?

Martín

We’re going to have a meeting in the next few days to make a final decision between two paths, two proposals I brought to Jorge last week. It seems like he’s leaning towards one of them, is that right? Which is the one I was working on.

Jorge

Well, on an installation level, it comes in the wake of what he did in Espai 13 (Fundació Miró, Barcelona). So, it’s to do with video.

Martín

Yes, it’s to do with video… With installation, perhaps with multiple screens. The thing is, if we had already decided which of the two proposals to choose, we would tell you about it. But you’ve caught us just when we’re still thinking about it…

Your work always takes the world of comics as a reference point – an area you’re very knowledgeable on, especially the most underground kind of comic. But then you always reposition it. You take an event or a reference, but then you like to deal with certain themes that are separate from it. So, perhaps you do know what you are going to talk about (in your new project) because there’s a theme there that’s coming to the fore.

Martín

Yes, I think both proposals are related to the film industry, which is what I was developing in Espai 13, too. In a similar vein, I’m investigating things to do with animation in the 1930s: production mechanisms, the construction of the image and how that was standardised in a certain way in the industry at the time, which paved the way for it working more or less in the same way today. Then I am also looking into mainstream cinema a bit more, or Hollywood cinema, and the impact strategies in the image in relation to the language they develop for special effects.

Jorge

And all of this has a certain ideological backdrop, which exudes from the uses of resources and this language.

So, what is left to decide? Just formalising it all?

Martín

It’s all quite connected. As I make progress with formalising things, the conceptualisation part of the work also becomes more established. I think what we need to do is to say this one or this one. And consider when is the best time for one thing or the other, in terms of where I am coming from, which is the Espai 13 exhibition.

I would like to go back to what you said about Martin’s first exhibition, about
the fact that the work he was doing garnered a lot of commercial interest. And I’d like to know, Jorge, how you contend with what the market is asking of you and the artists’ own processes, like in the case of Martín, who is interested in experimenting with other, less commercial formats.

Jorge

I think that in Martin’s case, it was a very fluid thing, because you have to be aware of the implications of taking certain risks and moving away from something you know is working… That has to be a decision that is – well, I wouldn’t say shared, because it’s the artist’s decision. We already know there are a lot of different kinds of galleries, right?
I see my job as being to accompany, rather than to translate the work into money, though obviously that’s also important for everyone. But I would never dream of getting in the way of an artist who wants to develop their work. What happened with Martín was that, when we started to exhibit his work, the work had already been done for a while. He dug deep into it and a time came when… It’s not that it was all used up, but the work was asking to be developed, in other formats.
We both knew it’s obviously easier to sell a collage than a video installation, and that an installation requires a space. You also start to target other types of collections, of collectors, when you change the format. We knew the economic results were going to be very different. But you just have to persevere, and I think we’ve always understood one another in this sense. It was very clear that you weren’t going to stay doing what you had always done. Right, Martín?

Martín

When you start to mechanise your work, well, I don’t know, there are artists who do do this, who have this type of creation process, while there are others who need to get some fresh air when it’s all very condensed. To have found a gallery or a person like Jorge is also to have someone who can always offer you that perspective. It’s that level of risk but also of enjoyment. Because it’s great to have company as you forge a new path. I haven’t worked with any other gallery, but at least with this one, it has allowed me to open my work up to other possibilities. Then we can all draw our own conclusions, and at the same time, we wonder: is it possible to keep doing the same thing while forging another path? How can the artist do both of these things in parallel?

But anyway, when I started working with comics, it’s not something I thought would be commercial. I mean, you do something and then, suddenly, you find… And afterwards, it was always a very serious thing I had in mind, about opening up, expanding the language, from the comic as a starting point, and never the art market.

Jorge

Yes, I would add that what happened in Martín’s case is that what he was doing in his first pieces, his collages – and this might sound like an exaggeration – they were perfect. I mean, he couldn’t go any further. He himself was all used up, because this tendency he had to expand, things he found in comic panels, how he did it, it was all perfect on its own. It forged a path in the sense that this way of formalising things was abandoned and it led you to other things. But he couldn’t leave it at that, because he used it all up, because they are perfect; that was also their virtue and why they were so commercially attractive, among other things.
They also worked because one of the characteristics of Martín’s work is that respect towards what was already there in the comic is inherent in everything he does. So, people who have read those comics appreciate them because they understand exactly what is happening there and they even have a personal link to it.

I remember pieces that were just the empty frame (of the comic); it’s like they were starting to have that volume. It felt like a turning point, when I saw that piece. Because space was very obviously starting to come into things.

Jorge

Indeed, well spotted, because when the panels themselves, the actors, disappear from the pages, then you’re starting to talk about the spatial framework that houses them. That gives way to a volume, and other types of constructions begin, like what you did in Vienna or that piece that was in CentroCentro, where the empty panel space gives rise to that depth, that expansion of space. Is that right, Martín?

Martín

Yeah, yeah. Well, there are a lot of ways of seeing it, and that’s one. The other is the opposite: it’s the organisational space on the page, which is what we don’t see. We’re always looking inside the panel, but not on the edges or between them. And, in the end, that ends up being the place where the images are revealed. So, that grid is there and it’s not there, when you’re reading a comic. I see it as part of the frame, what gives the story its shape, what gives the sequence its shape and organises it. It’s empty, too, when it appears, but when I isolate it, it becomes material, it becomes matter.

That (idea of the frame) evokes the idea of a mirror for me too. Suddenly, the frame is the empty space where reality is reflected. Your projects connect from the past to the present moment, right? They isolate ideas, concepts that you can easily bring to your own reality. You can see yourself reflected in them.

Martín

How lovely!

Jorge

In terms of that identification between Martín’s work and the comic, it was indeed born there, but it’s actually about an analysis of language, and that’s what’s leading him to work not just with animation – obviously, a very familiar format – but also with cinematographic language. The relationship between the language of comics and that of cinema is obvious when it comes to how time and space are treated, and many other areas. But I just wanted to point out how that transition to an analysis of other languages – which is what he is doing now – makes total sense.

In your case, Martín, you like playing, right? Trying things out, experimenting. But, Jorge, other artists tend to become stagnant: how do you encourage them to play, too, and to try things out?

Jorge

I’m struggling to think of any artist I work with who has stagnated.

Perhaps that’s the profile you’re interested in.

Jorge

What does happen is that, when we think up an exhibition that might be a year away, or sometimes more, let’s say there’s a margin… And from that moment on, a whole process is activated, and it related to and, as you said before, heavily influenced by what the space in L’Hospitalet is like, what the gallery is like. What I have noticed is that one of the gallery’s strengths is that the projects end up being very site-specific, because the space is very present and so is the history of what happened there. The exhibitions act as layers on top of the space, in the sense that any artist who puts on an exhibition there, even if they are from overseas, is very aware of what has happened in the space, and that has a positive effect, I think. In some ways, it also stops artists from repeating themselves. For example, take Sergio Prego’s exhibition with the fountains. The fountains, which he had made in Venice (Spanish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale 2019) as an outdoor installation, had to be made indoor here… The forms were new and how they worked in the space was entirely different. I also have to say and accept that if I were a gallerist who sold a lot and regularly, that tension regarding whether or not we are going to continue to sell would be greater. That’s not the case, unfortunately. This is more a feeling of treading a path together and fighting for others to understand it.

And that’s lovely, too: what you said about ‘genealogy’, about each project coming together with the others, about there being a conversation among all of them. When you visit the ethall project, you certainly see that, a series of relationships.

Jorge

For example, I was surprised by Antonio Menchen’s exhibition. He’s an artist who had never been in the gallery before but who followed our programme. When we were working, he would name things from other exhibitions. He had them at the front of his mind, even if they were very far removed from his practice. So, yes, it’s something I’ve noticed: what has happened there has an influence, and that’s lovely.

Martín, have you received proposals from other galleries?

Martín

No, not really.

Jorge

Not really, to be honest. I’ve been in some collectives.
I get the feeling that, at the moment, there’s very little porosity between galleries, and that’s something I don’t like. It’s as though each of them has its own pen: my hens are the best and I have no interest in any of the others. That seems like a mistake to me, in terms of business strategy. It’s as though you’re shooting yourself in the foot if you give any visibility to an artist who works with another gallery. And I don’t agree with that at all. When I put on an exhibition with an artist, what happens afterwards in our relationship remains to be seen and will be defined according to what happens in the exhibition and how we get on.
Perhaps it’s me, and I just can’t build rapport, but when I was starting out – not in galleries, more on my own – this exchange between galleries, of artists and exhibitions, was commonplace. And now it’s hard to do.

Perhaps it’s harder within the same city.

Jorge

Yeah. But look, when I opened the gallery, I did an exhibition with Ignacio Uriarte. He was on the crest of a wave, and he was working with NoguerasBlanchard. On top of that, at that time, NoguerasBlanchard was 300 metres from my gallery. Ignacio came over and said, ‘I like this space. I’d like to do something here. Don’t worry, I’ll talk to Álex (Nogueras)’. And it was all fine, no friction at all. Quite the opposite, actually: total ease, and that seems like such a natural thing to me. But it’s not common.

But building relationships with other galleries can be useful to gallerists themselves. For example, if Martín had an exhibition in another country

Jorge

Yeah, yeah. I’m open to that, of course. Take fairs, for instance. Before, fairs were much more of a place for exchange. When you took part, you weren’t only thinking about selling; you were also thinking about establishing those types of relationships and discovering artists who work with other galleries, in other contexts. I think that happens very rarely now. Galleries go to fairs and they have who they can sell on their radar, and the rest is incidental. I’m not saying it’s irreversible. Really, the subject of fairs is an issue in itself.

But it’s true that young gallerists do tend to interact more and collaborate at fairs.

Jorge

Yes, they are starting to do that.

From my position in a gallery, I think it’s very common on an international level. We do a lot of collaborations. But perhaps it’s true that people are more reluctant in Spain, they are more scared of doing it. When it’s the other way around, it’s all about opening up perspectives, embarking on shared adventures, opening up the market…

Well, in my experience, I’ve seen that when there’s a collaboration, there can be quite a lot of problems when it comes to closing sales…

Jorge

From what you’re saying, I get the feeling that these collaborations are framed within market share. And not within promoting an artist, getting involved with their career, or giving them the chance to work on a project, which is perhaps more my style of working, so that’s why I have more difficulties. I think it’s more to do with market share. It’s not about building relationships in terms of working and collaborating as a platform for developing an artist’s work. That’s what I don’t see.
For me, the market doesn’t have much to do with the art itself.

Finding partners who take the risk is difficult, too. We know each other and have a more personal relationship from having met and coincided at fairs. And due to the type of work galleries do – more conceptual, often slower – they require a different type of relationship.
There aren’t many galleries with your profile; that’s why it’s hard to find partners, I’d imagine.

One final question: what do you think makes relationships between artists and gallerists last?

Jorge

For me, it’s about sharing a work ethic.

Martín

The same for me. Perhaps to go with what Jorge says, to go with the work ethic, trust is something that needs to be there. Respect and trust above all.

Jorge

Yes, and then there’s the ability to get excited about similar things. When you’re working on projects, if your interests don’t converge when it comes to what you’re working on, you won’t be enthusiastic about it.

Martín

Yeah, there are a lot of occasions during processes where we decide what’s right, what isn’t right, because different possibilities are always being weighed up, just like now. There are sometimes things that can easily be damaged because the gallerist comes along and says ‘No, not this’. And you have to be OK with that. That’s why I think there has to be respect and trust in this area. And I’d echo what Jorge says about there being mutual enthusiasm, because when then they come along and say ‘Ah, but yes to this’, then a whole starts to form. And that’s really cool because you work together like an engine. It all works well.

Jorge

I think a lot of it is down to the fact we’ve been working together for so long. It’s like when something is in its infancy, and you see its potential and can talk about it. Then, random ideas can emerge from a conversation, but then they gradually get distilled. That ability to see the potential in something is enthusiasm: suddenly, you see it and you say, ‘There’s something here’. We have that mutual understanding, so we see it in similar places. Obviously, these processes are different with every artist. So, in this sense, Martín and I are close. I think it’s also because we started at the same time. Martín has been very important for me as a supportive figure, even when talking about where the gallery is going. We accompany each other.