Francia Monjaraz

Espacio Impermanente and MADE present the exhibition by Francia Monjaraz: A la sombra de la higuera, as part of the project Salón 4307.

A la sombra de la higuera is the first solo exhibition by artist Francia Monjaraz. Presented at Espacio Impermanente, the exhibition is part of a series of exhibitions within the same space in collaboration with MADE in Monterrey.

In the intimacy of a room between walls covered with fragments, there hide blue beings that, when looked at, reveal a lot of secrets. In their corporeality we can see how each one has gone through processes where the artist-hand-tool, melts herself to pour into the interior of these creatures all those mysteries that nestle in her head. Auras, glimpses of mystical pasts and spaces that are neither here nor there, take shape to give a glimpse of how human absence creates silences.

Francia, in one conversation or another, mentioned to me that fantasy has always haunted her. Keys, daggers, beetles and armors have fascinated her for as long as she can remember.

Telling stories and taking refuge in them.

Growing up in a city as busy as Monterrey invites you to seek a refuge where you can satisfy your thirst for tranquility. All the time in a hurry, all the time without pause. In the total alienation of living in a concrete jungle, allowing oneself to dream sounds like a distant future. Learning to construct narratives based on non-factual facts requires awakening that imagination which, in adulthood, shrinks to the point of disappearing. Although no one teaches us to imagine, we are all born with the capacity to do so, leaving us with a dilemma: to let ourselves be carried away by the sway of fantasy or to be swallowed up by the biting reality.

In this exhibition, Monjaraz takes us to observe from her fantastic windows, putting a pause to everything we consider really important. In the calm and quiet, playing as a child observer becomes the only task. In an enveloping atmosphere, under the bluish shade of a fig tree, a journey begins where sensation and intuition are the only way to navigate.

— María Micha