NO HAY MAS CIEGO QUE EL QUE NO QUIERE VER"

"NO MORE BLIND THAN THOSE WHO CHOOSE NOT TO SEE"

A solo project by Marisa Caichiolo at VIDEOAKT Biennal curated by Angie Bonino at MAC Museum of Contemporary Art, Lima, Perú and LUM Museum of Memory, Place of Memory and History, Lima, Perú.

"For CaichIolo, embroidery has been present in several of her works; it is a medium and a language she has employed for over a decade. She has worked with precious threads on paper, with hair on elegant silver service sets, and now, on white cotton handkerchiefs. The aesthetic exercise, which is also political, does not stop at embroidery.
The reading system is transferred to the ceramics she manually creates, made during an artistic residency in Morocco. She dyes these signs red, those dots required for communication and the construction of a language. This is how she reconstructs memory and makes oblivion evident.
For a second stage of the series, she has turned to the use of Artificial Intelligence— a medium that excites and terrifies her equally— to create cybernetic embroideries with even longer texts, leaving the observer astonished and excluded from their meaning. The digital handkerchiefs are now accompanied by masks that silence the person wearing them. In this way, Marisa Caicholo’s work—which is always honest and profound—invites us to reflect on the importance of memory and inclusion, on the blood shed drop by drop that is stitched point by point. It intrigues and invites a desire to know the translation of the messages. However, the
message is very clear and available to those who choose to see it." Laura Ayala Castellanos

Through the fusion of embroidered textiles with Braille code, objects, and video, Caichiolo has created a project that invites us to reconsider certain questions that may arise from collective memory. Delving into the unsettling legacy of forced disappearances suffered by individuals due to state terrorism in Argentina, especially during and after the harrowing era of the civic-military dictatorship known as the 'National Reorganization Process' between 1976 and 1983, this installation encourages us to rethink the tragedy by engaging other senses, such as touch in this case.

However, just as an expert reader can decipher the hidden meaning in a passage in Braille, we can also strive to illuminate the stories of the disappeared, give voice to those who do not have one, and honor the memory of those who have vanished due to the ravages of human conflict. In a world where the visible often eclipses the invisible, let us remember that true visibility does not lie in what we see at first glance, but in the depths of our empathy and our commitment to justice and memory. “In this work, the Braille code ‘There is no one more blind than he who does not want to see’ is used as a tool to remind us that even in the absence of sight, we can still find a way to see, connect, and testify to the invisible truths that lie beneath the surface of our collective history.” — Marisa Caichiolo.