http://asformigas.info
https://mariallop.wordpress.com
 

Maria Llop

She was born in Barcelona (1981). She studied music at a professional level at Badalona Conservatory and Fine Arts at the University of Barcelona. She graduated from the Bologna Academy of Fine Arts (Italy) and studied for a Masters in Artistic Development at the Munich Academy of Fine Arts (Germany).

Her artistic journey has passed through various stages and interests, taking her from the institutions and venues that are dedicated to the exhibition of artistic production to more collective venues that are critical of the way art is produced and communicated. She has taken part in various exhibitions at the Munich Academy of Fine Arts (2009), the Cervantes Institute (2009), the Trento and Rovereto School of International Studies (2007) and the NEON> CAMPOBASE gallery in Bologna (2007). In 2010, she took part in a residency at the Deutsches Museum in Munich.

In late 2010, she returned to Barcelona and her interests changed: she gravitated towards diversity and feminism, where collective creative experience became the centre of attention and individual work became less important. This interest took her to heterogeneous venues where she came into daily contact with realities which made a deep impression on her. From that moment onwards, her artistic work was delimited by another context and has blossomed in relation to craftwork, education, art therapy and collective work. It is developed around concepts and concerns relating to collectivity, politics, greater awareness of social, emotional and identity aspects and the relevance of the singular reality of the system that determines who we are.

Therefore, in recent years, she has combined various collaborations. In the field of live education, she works creatively with children, in the Taller de l’Oli workshop she is working on a shoe-making project (La Planta del Peu or Sole of the Foot), and at the Banc Expropiat's Taller de Teler de Cintura she pays careful attention to internal movements and the experiences of opening-up offered by artistic processes.

Presentation updated in September 2019

Vanessa Varela

She was born in Lugo (1979), and graduated in Fine Arts from the University of Vigo. She moved to Barcelona in 2005, where she later studied for a Masters in artistic productions and research (2012).

Her curiosity about the various uses and contexts of artistic practices have led her to develop projects not only within the artistic institution, but also in other more heterogeneous contexts. From small-scale interventions in public places to creating works that are increasingly more collective and hybrid in nature, her interest has turned from the piece of art as an element that connects a wide range of concepts to an interest in creating meeting places as a pretext for coordinating co-narration work. These collaborative and collective learning forums have also led to concern about the material (and emotional) conditions in which artistic practices are produced or developed.

She has had exhibitions in the Joan Miró Foundation’s Espai 13 (2019), in Arts Santa Mònica (Ingràvid, 2014) and in the Sala d’Art Jove (2010). In parallel, she has taken part in a small publishing company that publishes art books, Ediciones Modelo (2010-12), and in the art and activism group Enmedio, with whom she developed ideas such as the “Cómo acabar con el Mal” [How to End Evil] sessions (2012). She has presented projects in artistic-production laboratories, such as Liminal GR and Habitació 1418 (Macba). In recent years, she has collaborated with the needlework group Niu d’Aranyes, the Grup de Mitja Subversiva and the Banc Expropiat's Taller de Teler de Cintura, where they collectively experiment with the narrative possibilities of textile practices from a feminist standpoint.

 Presentation updated in September 2019