the wandering home of artist books
and its wanderings
M.A.L.A. – The Wandering Home of Artist Books – was born from a desire to foster a closer connection with the multifaceted world of artist books. In these unique works, images, photographs, drawings, writings, maps, graphics, and other elements fill the pages, shaping constructive spaces and visual narratives that challenge our conventional understanding of books. This raises the question: what possibilities does the book offer as a medium for artistic expression?
To explore this question, we conceived an artistic residency focused on deepening creative processes and developing individual projects. The residency also aims to explore the underlying themes of artistic production, creating a framework that addresses these questions by providing guidance and references to expand the poetic and visual repertoire in its hybrid and interactive possibilities. This approach enables the development of a personal language integrated with the relevant content of each participant's sensory and subjective reality.
All participants will be encouraged to complete the creation of an artist book, which will then travel in the 'mala' to an international exhibition. In this first edition, we will have an exhibition in Mexico City at the El Rule Cultural Center during the Zócalo International Book Fair (FIL) in October 2024, and another in São Paulo at the Página Gallery in November 2024.
displacements: contemporary perspectives
our 2024 theme
For this first edition, we propose a theme intrinsically linked to the conception of this project: displacement in space and time. Our special 'luggage' of books will take as its inspiring "motus" the rich territory of associations, allusions, and reinterpretations provided by the vast work of Guimarães Rosa.
Quoting a passage from 'The Devil to Pay in the Backlands': "I didn't much care for glints; what I saw, I saw in the world for myself. I had a bag that wasn't quite for travel or portfolios, but rather a saddlebag, my vagrant-style suitcase." In this passage, Riobaldo skillfully describes his suitcase as something flexible, transient, an artifact of his saddlebag, simultaneously half-full and half-empty. With this ambiguity, throughout the narrative, he leads us through territories that go beyond mere physical geographic movements through the sertão but also explore spaces filled with uncertainties and estrangements, representing an exploration of the internal limits and contradictions of his personality.
This brief excerpt, bringing us the "vagrant-style suitcase," inspires us and raises various questions, such as: what do we genuinely wish to carry and share with others? What reflections do we intend to provoke to encourage a more critical view of society through our work?
To stimulate new perspectives and dialogues, we hope that this theme serves as a narrative trigger, allowing each of us to create unique stories and aesthetic possibilities, giving them a singular poetic expressiveness.
We extend an invitation to explore new territories, whether geographical or symbolic, and that M.A.L.A., accompanied by these books, may not only transform estrangement into dialogue but also turn uncertainties into discoveries, awakening new perspectives and narratives in our artistic journey.