Vicenç Altaió, Joan Fontcuberta
2006
Asking for and donating blood involves a gesture saturated with symbols and emotions. The symbolic content corresponds to the symbolic process itself, because these three images made with the blood of loved ones also speak to us of transparency and opacity: the resistance of matter to being crossed by light, in a metaphor that involves the notion of truth. Ultimately, the Hemograms push us to delve into the forms of the trace and the vestige, that is, into the nature of the document as a trace.
Only with effort will the viewer be able to identify the origin of images that are closer to a fantastic imaginary than to the description of something so vital and familiar. Because only with effort –that of thought, that of sensitivity– will we be able to identify any origin: God, Science, Freedom.
Joan Fontcuberta
An aluminum box contains a fold-out triptych book made of glass, felt and blood. The text, by Vicenç Altaió, consists of three decalogues. There is one for God, one for Science and one for Freedom. When the triptych is closed, the three decalogues rest on each other and embrace the blood they contain.
The images, conceived by Joan Fontcuberta, are the result of three drops of blood from three different donors – friends – fixed on a strip of transparent acetate. Once coagulated, the drop of blood is used as a photographic cliché. The image from the cliché is engraved on the glass using the sandblasting technique. Using this technique, the sand scratches the glass, making it porous, and thanks to this the pigment can penetrate it and become fixed. The glass is then inked with blood-red ink, as if it were the matrix of an engraving. The blood, opaque and warm, has been fixed on a transparent and cold glass support.
This book was presented by Joan Fontcuberta, Vicenç Altaió and Tinta Invisible at the Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) in 2006.
The edition contains:
1 book made up of 3 sandblasted and inked tempered glass panels, mounted on an articulated aluminium base, and a felt sleeve with the texts silk-screened.
3 texts by Vicenç Altaió.
3 images of Joan Fontcuberta.
1 silkscreened aluminum box.