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Guerra de la Paz is a collaborative experience of two artists (Alain Guerra and Neraldo de la Paz) working together. Established in 1996, the name Guerra de la Paz represents a creative team effort, an ongoing collaborative process that unifies two distinct styles through common aesthetics and interests. Alain Guerra and Neraldo de la Paz work with found objects and mostly with recycled clothes in a sort of "clothes sculptures" and site-specific installations that create a new conception of art. Both living in Miami since 1996 and both born in Cuba and raised in the United States, they sh are the same background and the same process of assimilating a new culture from an early age. As a team, Guerra de la Paz have participated in important shows such as Ephemeral/Trends II at Merrill Lynch ARTEAMERICAS (2004), The Cultural Resource Center at the Government Center in Miami (2004), "Seven Deadly Sins, a Sculpture Installation in Art Loves Design of ART BASEL MIAMI BEACH 2003, at The Buena Vista Building, Design District. They have just presented a site-specific installation, "Eden", in the exhibition "Between Art and Life: From Joseph Cornell to Gabriel Orozco" at The Miami Art Museum. Guerra de la Paz are among the most promising artists in the Miami area.
Milagros Bello: Tell me about your history as artists.
Alain Guerra:
I have had an ongoing fascination with the arts, with science and history for as long as I can remember. Having been born in Havana, Cuba and partly raised in Madrid, Spain, I had the fortune of experiencing different cultures as I grew up. I've been drawing, painting and conceptualizing since I was a child, strongly influenced by the works I saw at El Prado. I lived for several years in Chicago, where I went to school. I absorbed as much information as I possibly could from my travels in the East Coast, the Midwest, and abroad, but Miami has been my home and a main source of inspiration for most of my life.
Neraldo dela Paz:
Since my childhood in Matanzas, Cuba, I have been fascinated by putting together incongruous materials, (mostly found objects) creating assemblages that nourished my imagination. Preferring the small self-made fetish creations over the numerous battery-run toys my father would buy for me in Havana. We left Cuba abruptly in 1961 and came to Miami. I was enrolled in an American school when I did not speak a word of English. At a time when bilingual education was not available, I found myself occupying my time with assorted art supplies while the rest of the class went about their lessons. The art made during this time was probably my first body of work, and I realized that it made me different and special. During this time a family friend who was an artist gave me a book on the works of Salvador Dali. That changed my view of the physical world forever. After spending only a year and a half in Miami, my family relocated to the Chicago area.
Early exposure to Performance, Earthworks, Conceptual Art, Experimental
Theatre, Dance, and Music allowed for the development of an aesthetic that combines traditional art forms with cutting edge concepts. A mixture of the art disciplines and my subconscious Latin roots congeal into a distinct look to my work. These interests have always led me to experimentation and to work outside of the status quo.
MB: You work together as artists and produce a collaborative work under the name of "Guerra de la Paz" which, surprisingly, combines your two last names, "Guerra" and "de la Paz", the English meaning of which is "War of Peace"...How did this happen?
Guerra, de la Paz:
We began collaborating after moving back to Miami from Chicago in 1996, when we found a studio to share in Miami's Little Haiti. We had worked separately up to that point but through verbal input, we found ourselves growing more interested in each other´s aesthetics and mindset.
Our first collaborative painting "Drowning in Birch"(1996), introduced us to sharing the picture´s plane and taking turns on two-dimensional figurative work. It led to a body of paintings on found boards inspired by the Fayums
Portraits, titled "Hyaloids". Moving quickly on to a decollage technique, we experimented with abstraction using magazine paper on billboards found throughout our neighborhood. Several series came out of this decollage process including, "Glossies" (1998-2001), and "Breakthrough"(2001-2002), which was exhibited during Art Basel Miami Beach 2002, at Dorsch Gallery, along with a multi-part installation based on the dualities of life, "The Back Room"(2002), simultaneously on view in the vacant house next to our studio in Little Haiti. The transformation of the one time crack house into a pseudo underground club/fun house, mixed with religious iconography, created a space with light, sound, and performances, where one was confronted with the dichotomies of the physical and the spiritual worlds. This was our start as Guerra de la Paz...
MB: I recently saw at the Miami Art Museum?s exhibit "Between Art and Life" your piece "Eden", a site-specific installation recreating a Garden of Eden, with an immense "tree" full of branches, "flowers" and "rocks", all of them made with recycled clothes. How did you get to the idea of using this particular material?
Guerra, de la Paz:
We have been working with "clothing sculptures" since 2002. Neighboring our studio, there are rag shops that accumulate used clothing for export to the Third World countries. They house thousands of rejected garments. We've often been mesmerized by the unmatched color saturation of these fabrics and the shimmering of the furs, beads and sequins that peek through. We've often reflected on how to get the same effects in our work and what better way than by using the same materials.
MB: How did you build "Eden"? Did you use internal metal structures to support it? How did you select the clothes? Did you wash the clothes before using them?
Guerra, de la Paz:
We have an arrangement with a nearby business that exports used clothes to Haiti. The garments for "Eden" were collected from the clothes that were not going to be used for export. The piece usually dictates what colors, textures or sheens to select. For example, when collecting the clothing that represents the sand, we preferred woven knits in neutral colors or grainy patterns in the clothes. Then, they are aired out or washed, if necessary.
The wooden frame or "trunk" of the tree for "EDEN" consists of recycled metal materials. The "leaves" are green garments that are attached to nets that hang from the ceiling. The "rocks" are clothes that have been rolled up into a ball. The "flowers" are made out of assorted evening dresses, tutus, and little girls' socks. The "water" is comprised of items in hues of blue, silver and white, with reflective fabrics such as silk and satin in order that they shimmer when the light hits their surface.
In the current pieces, we have applied the color theories of the Impressionists and the Post-Impressionists, substituting each impressionist brushstroke with a garment...
MB: What is the message in "Eden"?
Guera de la Paz:
It addresses the modern myth that the Earth is an infinite resource and, at the same time an infinite garbage can, although it insinuates an unspoiled environment. Essentially, the piece is made from the "America's Garbage" idea, having used materials which, were it not for our intervention, would have been destined to the landfill.
In "Eden", we want to exaggerate the beauty we find in nature; a beauty like the one we find in a fantastic dream completely removed from reality. In the real world, beauty is always balanced out by the unsightly, like our dreams are by our fears.
MB: In a recent interview you said that these used clothes, with their marks, smell or shapes, and belonging to all kinds of people, are a sort of representation of Humankind...
Guerra, de la Paz:
We believe that human energy is embodied in these garments, and when they are gathered in large quantities you really feel their presence. Each piece of clothing is unique, and when singled out they can reveal a small part of the identity of the individual who once wore them.
MB: Your have created other interesting pieces such as the Series "Seven Deadly Sins" also made with used clothes...
Guerra, de la Paz:
"Seven Deadly Sins" was exhibited in the Miami Design District's Buena Vista Building on the event Art Loves Design sponsored by Dacra, during Art Basel Miami Beach 2003. It is a mixed media installation composed of seven sculptures representing the seven sins, Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust, Anger, Greed, Sloth, made from found objects with the focus on clothing. It explores social issues and the psychological implications of human behavior, and like the sins themselves, each piece can be interpreted for its range of complexities and the definition of the sins.
For example in the sculpture "PRIDE", which means an excessive belief in one?s own abilities that interferes with the individual?s recognition of the grace of God, we used a military jacket previously sent to be dry-cleaned and pressed and then we presented it just as it had been received from Pride Cleaners, flanked by a golden dress and apron, perched on a golden hanger that represents the quintessential housewife. This piece alludes to a "proud" officer and his trophy, "the wife", hanging side by side as a symbol of a perfect union. In the piece "ENVY", which alludes to the desire for others? traits, status, abilities, or situation, we built a little green monster composed of small children´s' costumes. One was a hairy green alien suit. The second, a head piece (hood) of a green eyed dragon with pointy teeth... In the piece "ANGER", which is manifest in the individual who spurns love and opts instead for fury, we proposed a black and white size 6, Nicole Miller dress that appears tailored to the dress form presented with violent rips on the torso, a face with little beady eyes and a mouth that snarls, suggesting the emotion of anger.
MB: How do you sell your sculptures, which are so different from the traditional ones?
Guerra de la Paz:
We have made a few smaller trees, about three feet tall, and we are in the process of creating more for a series we call, 'Bonsai'. They, too, are sculptures derived from clothing.
MB: What has your experience in Miami been like?
Guerra de la Paz:
Miami has grown into an international destination, but can it compete with the more established cities in the global community? If you could categorize it into human stages, we could say that it is now out of its infancy. We are here to grow with it and look forward to puberty.
MB: What about future exhibitions?
Guerra de la Paz:
There is "Circle-Rectangle-Square", which will be up on March 16, 2004 through May 5,04, organized by Rem Cabrera for The Resource Center at GovernmentCenter in Miami. It will showcase an overview of abstract paintings, and mixed media made in decollage technique. Installation concepts are currently in the works for next season with curator Samantha Salzinger, for the Art and Culture Center of Hollywood.
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