Nada es suficiente (Nothing is Enough) by Carlos Lara

Nada es suficiente is the name of the most recent solo exhibition by Monterrey artist Carlos Lara. Thirteen pieces located inside a small white room full of friends, colleagues, and supporters made it clear that it was about something more melancholic than nostalgic. What we observed during the opening on Friday, June 17 at Yo Studio were Carlos’s university works—some dusted-off, others replicas—each one conceptualized during his formative stage as a visual artist, a learning process that began when he was still a teenager. Perhaps for this reason, the first thing I see upon entering is Caguamones. This piece of cement, glass, and vinyl is a game that is as funny as it is cruel, simulating a couple of very cold beers. The historical drought that we are living through made the experience particularly annoying. My companion whispers to me, “They’re as cold as a bricklayer’s ankle.” I didn’t know the saying but I immediately knew what he was talking about. It concerned what Carlos so often explores in his work: popular culture and its relationship with the workforce.

Immediately afterwards, I am drawn to Las paredes invisibles, las máscaras podridas y todos aquellos paisajes grises que atormentan silenciosamente [The Invisible Walls, the Rotten Masks, and All Those Gray Landscapes that Silently Haunt], a projection of a fly that seems to hover next to a bag of water hanging from the ceiling, as used in homes and taquerías in order to drive away insects in hot weather. According to the artist, the fly embodies the fears he felt during his university years. Just like the fly faced with the alteration of its image on the refractory surface, Carlos faced distortions of self-perception, a condition typically associated with adolescence. The caricatured aggrandizement of a young and inexperienced ego was paralyzing, as were the processes of artistic education that frequently stifled the spontaneity of his ideas. Having been Carlos’s teacher during that time, his reflections moved me. And I had the same reflections when I studied the same degree at the same university. The word “carrera,”*1 which we use so much for talking about professionalization, came to me suddenly and I couldn’t help but feel a little bit of sadness when I understood the exhibition’s outlook: the dilemma of art education. Do we teach about art, or do we teach how to think like an artist? Do we teach how to integrate professionals into a market, or do we teach how to question that market? What will be the goal of that “carrera”? Is it only adolescence that causes paralysis and frustration that distresses art students, or is it the institutions and their processes?

I continue around the gallery observing Carlos’s works, many of them singing of nonconformity and the troubles of an apprentice. It is worth mentioning Como pez en el agua [Like a Fish in Water], a composition of a Betta fish (also known as a Siamese fighting fish) languishing inside a tank, looking towards a seascape printed in acrylic on the wall. Despite owing its deplorable state to the pet store where it was purchased, the life expectancy of the small animal is as unfavorable as it is depressing inside the gallery, and I cannot go without affirming that the use of a living being for the sake of artistic gesture will always be difficult to justify. That said, the piece’s irony is not lost on me, and I wonder if art education is justifiable. Fortunately, adolescence does not only bring frustration, and I come across Paisaje lunar [Lunar Landscape], a work that reflects the artist’s sense of humor through a digital printing of the patch in his beard. I recently read that those crater-like patches on male beards can be caused by stress. At that moment I ask Carlos to pose next to his portrait; I take a photo of him and we laugh.

Finally, I encounter the piece that best communicates the show’s premise: La ausencia de respuestas a muchas preguntas [The Absence of Answers to Many Questions]. A Sisyphus and his colossal stone, drenched in black paint at the center of a white cube model, portraying a scene of impossibility. The marks splashed on the wall are reminiscent of mounted works, evidencing an incessant battle between the artist and the gallery that he aims to conquer. As much as the painted sphere is pushed, the marks caused by the stone’s contact with the walls will not make the space uniform. What remains is the messiness, the accident, and the unfinished gestures. Nothing is enough.

Thinking that I would return home more full of worries than hopes, Carlos surprises me again. Heading towards the exit, I kneel to see "a shoe-spell"*2 that reads: When are we going to do everything we said we were going to do?

Ana Cadena Payton

Translated to English by Byron Davies

*1: In Mexico the word "carrera" ("career" in English) is used to describe both professionalization as well as racing (as in marathons or sprints)

*2: Legend has it that placing a handwritten note inside a shoe and wering it while walking is supposed to enamor the person to whom it is intended.