Micropoetry + Curatorial Monologues

Starting November a small Eastern-European country
that was silenced until recently
voted a capable woman.

Immediately after, a ¨big power¨, a country that prides itself of being big
voted an incapable man.

If you know Star Trek series, video-games like Final Fantasy, Dungeon and Dragons or movies like Alien, maybe you would like to know what plot inspired all of them, and on what the legendary monsters or gods are based on.

In 1950 The Voyage of the Space Beagle by A.E. van Vogt was published. It was a fix-up of four SF short stories fast published in different European languages and immediately started an influence that we can admire even now.

The title just added the word ¨space¨ to The Voyage of the Beagle, Charles Darwin's book about his five-year voyage around the world on HMS Beagle. The reference to Darwin is direct and for those familiar with the Luceafarul myth or Zburător or sburător (Romanian word meaning 'flyer') is a supernatural being in Romanian folklore, described as a "roving spirit who makes love to maidens by night".

The book was republished in 1952 under the title Mission: Interplanetary.

If interested in finding more about the myth, check: Zburătorul ('The Flyer/Flying Incubus) and Luceafărul (The Evening Star)

Having a big appetite for mythology, ancient arts and literature interest I´m easily attracted to repetitive intercultural characters, because I see a pattern of communication there, if we can recognize the same characteristics. In this case, the alien is a negative character, but in other stories it´s a neutral or even positive character, a super-hero. Eider way it´s quite important to recognize the alien character as an ancient ambivalent myth and one of the 4 main influencers world-wide.

A few years back I have found in a second-hand market a 1984 magazine (that´s the name) released in may 1983 that contained El viaje del Beagle Espacial as a comic in Spanish after A.E. van Vogt´s SF novel with drawings by the magnificent Luis Bermejo, well known Valencian illustrator and script (novel adaptation) by Rich Markopoulos. Bermejo makes a wonderful work with his black and white graphics, visual poetry for someone like me. Finding his dark illustrations in a flea market made a little immigrant women super happy. This comic is a part of my small treasure as I don´t own anything of valuable, besides my brain and a few books.

1984 was an adult magazine and horror stories or science fiction stories were published in adult magazines. It´s funny because today these monster stories have a younger target, whilst erotic narrative is specific to the adult public. Anyhow, as a comics fan that didn´t had comics in their childhood I´m glad with what adulthood reserves and having access to books, specially illustrated was a dream that I´m now enjoying with any occasion.

The majority of our stories, around the world are having similar narratives and the same ancient folk poetry characters apear in other places.

A.E. van Vogt was severely criticked by his rival that affected his reputation as a writer. The critique mocked him saying that he´s way of cutting the text was easy writing and that a writer using dreams for it´s writing is also super wrong. As a conclusion the critique was an imbécil, too classist to play with text or understand creation, also he might have been just envious and eager to end his so called rival´s career, even if in writing is not like in fighting.

At one point Philip K. Dick was asked what kind of authors influenced him and he pointed out A.E. van Vogt writing style, that inspired him. ¨His plots are marvels of interlocking pieces.¨ said P.K. Dick.

In fact, A.E. van Vogt was from an immigrant family and at home he used to speak Plautdietsch, a mix of Slavic, Dutch and German. This is an important aspect in a writer´s style as, having to express in an extra language things that do not exist in that language will implicitly interfere with the classic ways of expression. In this case something new was needed and Vogt developed this text cutting as a shortened version of saying a story.

If you ever tried to tell a story in another language, maybe you know that it can be a nightmare, that makes you feel like an alien, on a distant planet. Unless the others make an effort to understand, which is not to be seen until today. Immigrants adapt the way of communication, making the sentences more concentrated, in an intent of sending the correct message.

What´s the most curious about these language adaptations is that while immigrants make their pass through that language, they enrich it, developing new versions of it, personalizing it. A.E. van Vogt wasn´t always van, he changed the name at one point and judging by what happens still today, that people change their name to seem from another country to work in Customer Service I would say that this writer was an immigrant with a though life and wanted to make it better.

Why it is important to promote women's education?

Because they were and are education providers and guiders. Ladies are in charge with the child development since the pre-natal state. You give them access to education, they teach new generations.

In Education Sciences there is a dominant feminine presence. The fine dexterity processing skills makes women specialist in different domains and excellent teachers and their implication in occupational therapy or special education intervention is majoritary and undeniable.

Francesca Bonnemaison i Farriols demonstrated that even if you are rich, you can have a positive influence in your neighborhood by acting for human rights. She was a Spanish Catalan educator and promoter of women's education in Catalonia. Bonnemaison founded the Biblioteca Popular de la Dona (Women's Popular Library), the first library exclusively for women in Europe, in Barcelona in 1909.

The institution even had a bar and a restaurant, allowing women to enjoy a freedom that was absolutely unusual at the time. Women were not allowed to enter a restaurant until the 1970s in the rest of Spain.

It was the first women's library in Europe, offering working women access to culture, education and information. She offered classes in feminism, sewing, cooking, business calculation, typing, arithmetic, grammar in several languages, shorthand and physical education. The institution was created, managed and directed by women. One of the students was Maria Montessori, who later used the dexterity techniques and the educational model in special education.

Given that the institution created by Bonnemaison was free and dedicated to all categories of women, regardless of their social status and that the Montessori methods are in essence preschool educational approaches and professional education based on a sense of equality, she had to learn in Barcelona and I wonder why these methods are now a parallel educational model instead of being integrated into the school curriculum. In special education we use the so-called Montessori methods, in the preschool years and in classical education as well. Adapting space and tools to individual specificity, once we know the specificity, it is a matter of facilitating learning and guiding development.

Women's institutions are derived from the old village women's gatherings, Sezatori in my region, where they made fabrics, clothes, decorations or prepared food for the cold season. There are places where women met and connected for the community. In these kinds of gatherings, stories were told, songs were sung and tragedies were transformed into fabric paintings and local patterns.

Women's gatherings changed things silently but surely and where these groups collaborated, the whole region gained in quality of life and the younger generations were better protected. Access to education is a necessity and a right for which we are still fighting and precisely those who are responsible for teaching (mothers, grandmothers, aunts ...) are not supported to learn.

In Barcelona and Spain in general, the lack of access to education for women is observable in the culinary literature that disappeared for long periods, until recently. Many households still have a ceremonial chef and a multi-talented woman included, but not free.

Street art has this wonderful way of reinterpreting the victim as the villain and this wall is almost saying: Hey you, Wolfie, be careful with that Little Red Riding Hood, she might tame you, make you her dog!

For women, these messages are comforting, and underground art is doing a great job of showing the strong feminine part. There are more probabilities to find women characters that stand up from the painting pointing their gaze at you by walking the streets and interacting with the underground culture than in a big museum where ladies are pictured mostly as wives or working hard slaves and the most daring paintings made were of courtesans or prostitutes, many of them much too young and wearing alienation and unhappiness in their eyes.
This graffiti mural was made by Joel Arroyo at Boca Nord and it´s a women´s rights graffiti, but also an ecologic mural. It´s about a strong connection with the nature that people in Horta have and about strong ladies who do not fear dangers, but confront them and change things.

The tale of Little Red Riding Hood is a universal, ancient story of a little girl followed by a bad wolf in the woods. The story can be found in all parts of the world, mutated into other stories, and has links with other later myths and fairy tales, therefore an oral transmission. This character might be the skeleton of the biggest super-heroes that ever existed.
It is considered a European fairy tale and in its written version that we know from Perrault, it is a horror story in which the grandmother and Little Red Riding Hood are both devoured by a wolf that does not act like a wolf, but rather turns to drama and manipulative dialogue. In his version of the story, Perrault makes an allegory of child abuse and a clear introduction to the psychology of the young woman who is not able to identify the disguised danger and therefore cannot protect herself, and the same goes for the third age.
In Perrault's version, women are staged as in Lolita´s story, as the manipulative wolf is described more as an evil adult than a creature of the woods, pointing out the mental disequilibrium of a human predator who attempts to seduce a child.

Perrault's version is a bit grotesque, but closer to reality. It is a custom that girls use to take care of others, even little girls. Eastern European mythology is full of examples of this kind, and yes, there are dangers. As in real life, the woods are not as problematic as the predators that can follow small children into them. The wolf might change clothes or characters, but its intentions remain the same.
If you are ever curious about these kinds of horror predator stories, just talk to the elderly in the occupied territories, where there are plenty of examples of courageous little girl travelers and even way too early mothers who had to run away and survive in the mountains. Sometimes the reality was so terrifying that society had to push an imaginary monster to cover it.
In the Brothers Grimm version, the ending is made up and Little Red Riding Hood escapes with the help of a friend. There are many interpretations of the Brothers Grimm version that offer a happy ending to the story and insist on transforming the victim into a survivor character, a victor in the face of life's great dangers.

Joel Arroyo's version is a derivation of the Brothers Grimm, or in contemporary terms the transformation into a superhero. The whole mural has a delicious lilac vibe, purple tones that open to magenta and even the black wolf has an indigo glow.
I recently took this photo while visiting a miniature but impressive bakery across the street from where the painting was. From admiring the bread and pastries I pass on the street to admiring a redheaded woman with a wheat ponytail hairstyle under a magenta cape coat that is specific in cold areas. Her gaze is mean, like the gaze of a villain and the wolf is docile in her arms and more like a domestic dog.

Mural Art: Miss Van
Storytelling: Oana Maroti

A meeting between two cultures that bring together a diversity of flowers, fruits, vegetables, fashion, and songbirds.

One of the two women is disguised as a man, wearing a beak mask and epaulets on a sal, a scarf derivation of the sari fashion. The woman masked as a bird seems to support her friend, as she appears so sad, that hair grows from her eyes and olive oil plants come out of her head. She transforms, slowly becoming nature, perhaps to make sure that there is a way out. Her blouse recalls the ancient goddess, but the accessories, the hairstyle, and the connection with nature update in the files of my imagery of the Eastern European fairies who put some epaulets on the blouses and are presented to the court.

Miss Van challenges the viewer by exposing the history of fashion and botany, with strong accents of gothic and surrealist aesthetics, and transports us to the mystery and terror novel history. It is a complex painting, which I have admired for years now. I have taken many photos, not very good ones, but with different lights, phones, and seasons.

This mural was made in 2016, in Carrer Lepant, Barcelona for the FemGraff festival and it´s still there, intact, near the bus station, facing the metro station.

I was first attracted by the artist's decision to paint on a copper-colored wall, that is, the thermal insulation of the wall, which gives the buildings a rusty, abandoned appearance, but which also has a strong autumnal color, a seasonal color that I know as aramiu and that is seen in abundance in the deciduous forests (paduri de foi) that look to be on fire, during fall.

I used to walk by to admire this graffiti painting and exclaim: Phanthomas, The Phantom of the Opera, Poe, Molière, Mademoiselle Du Parc, The Marquise, The Mask, Lupin, Voltaire, Apollinaire and The Portrait of Fruits. A mural art that has numerous references to international literature and human rights fighters.

The cross-dressed woman and her bird mask recall the carnival, but what I see in the painting is an underground philosophy created to sustain those people who are consumed alive, those voices who are silenced, those tears who are forbidden.

Women in captivity are transforming as a defense mechanism and the underground shows that transformation.

Biting into a succulent green tomato,🤤

Autumnal Sensations
Olfactive and Taste Receptors On
Mind Settings: No Waste

These days
the gourmet pairing projects
and preserving techniques
can provide food
for the rest of the year.

Have you ever traveled from one continent to another just by looking at the people?

Our features are so mixed by now that it shows off.

With all the efforts
to redefine identity,
layers of ourselves
speak out loud
of different realities,
of concepts in which we dream,
of places
where memories are.

Dijo entonces :"Nunca más".

Esta certera respuesta dejó mi alma traspuesta;

"Sin duda - dije-, repite lo que ha podido acopiar

del repertorio olvidado de algún amo desgraciado

que en su caída redujo sus canciones a un refrán:

"Nunca, nunca más".

De-atâtea nopți aud plouând,
Aud materia plângând..
Sunt singur, și mă duce un gând
Spre locuințele lacustre.
Și parcă dorm pe scânduri ude,
În spate mă izbește-un val --
Tresar prin somn și mi se pare
Că n-am tras podul de la mal.
Un gol istoric se întinde,
Pe-același vremuri mă găsesc..
Și simt cum de atâta ploaie
Pilonii grei se prăbușesc.
De-atâtea nopți aud plouând,
Tot tresărind, tot așteptând..
Sînt singur, și mă duce-un gând
Spre locuințele lacustre.