Talleres MAPEA en el Calvario y casco del Hatillo, Caracas 2018
Video de Andres Catalano
MAPEA: Natalya Critchley, Cheo Carvajal, Monica Santander, Yoandy Medina con el apoyo del Sr Jose Gonzalez y Carlos Barreto de la Co-operativa en el Calvario
Talleres con los estudiantes de 4to, 5to y 6to grado de las escuelas Maria May (el Calvario) y Juan Manuel Cajigal (en el casco del Hatillo)
An essential condition for a sustainable city is that it can be walked around comfortably and safely. That it should be accesible to all. Another is that it should be mixed, not only in it’s uses -residential, offices, public spaces and features-, but socially as well. Another condition? To achieve a balance with whatever natural features still exist: water courses, green spaces, trees, biological diversity. Even though it sounds obvious the air must be clean to be able to breath properly! But also in a metaphorical sense, what is on offer should be so diverse that you just want to be there, day or night. That ‘habitability’ leads us to an additional wish: it must be enjoyable.
Una condición indispensable para que la ciudad sea sustentable es que se pueda caminar de manera cómoda, segura. Que sea accesible para todos. Otra es que sea mezclada, no sólo en sus usos –residencias, comercios, oficinas, espacios y equipamientos públicos–, sino también socialmente. ¿Otra condición?, que logre un equilibrio con lo que ella todavía tiene de natural: cursos de agua, espacios verdes, arbolado, diversidad biológica. Aunque suene obvio hay que decirlo: ¡que se pueda respirar, que tenga aire limpio! Pero también en sentido metafórico: que la oferta sea tan diversa que den ganas de vivir en ella, de día y de noche. Esas “ganas de vivir en ella” nos lleva a un deseo adicional: que sea lúdica.
This pop-up exhibition is the result of my participation in the Prairie Ronde Artist Residency series here in Vicksburg, MI. The programme was established as part of the Papermill renovation project. The drawings were carried out both onsite at the mill, and in the Hills Pharmacy as the idea for the show was developed.
It was fascinating to finally visit a papermill building, I had already seen many in the area. In Parchment, Kalamazoo there is a huge abandoned factory that I was very curious about when I first saw it, but was warned it was difficult to get into and dangerous. Having been such an important industry in the region I was sure there must be an opportunity somewhere. So, on reading about this residency programme I could hardly contain my enthusiasm, and it was very rewarding to be admitted.
My initial reaction on visiting the mill was admiration for the early industrial architecture, as in the specialised designs for the work spaces required at the beginning of the last century, with so many windows to make the most of natural light. The beautiful wooden beam structure of the top floor of the East wing, which allows overhead light in through the roof with north facing windows, would make the perfect studio for any artist. And it goes to show the attention to detail for producing a high quality product, since it was here that the cotton rags were first sorted before washing and beating into pulp. Continue reading “Papermill DNA”
Maddox Arts summer show in London included a couple of my drawings
MAPEA define la acción del equipo transdisciplinario que acompaña a la artista Natalya Critchley en el desarrollo de un método creativo, grupal, experimental, de elaboración de mapas visuales a gran escala sobre papel, que son el resultado plástico de sucesivas experiencias movilizadas por la artista en entornos urbanos diversos.
Consiste en un proceso de trabajo que involucra, en un determinado contexto local, a un grupo de estudiantes y docentes de educación básica con practicas creativas de reconocimiento de su entorno, basadas en la acción consciente de caminar el espacio publico, de andar la calle, identificando los propios referentes locales, espaciales, geográficos, urbanos, peatonales, y la reflexión en torno a los modos -impuestos, o posibles- de ejercer y/o modificar esos recorridos en su territorio.
Exposición de pintura en Camino a Comala: Café de especialidad, Santa María la Ribera, Ciudad de México, Octubre 2017
La ciudad a través de una rendija
Son simplemente vistas a través de una grieta, o más bien una rendija, que se dan en mi deambular urbano diario. Espacios perdidos, parciales, privados, derruidos, escondidos, fugaces. Los enfoco a distancia entre muros de concreto que los oscurecen, aunque su bella luz sigue produciendo esa atmósfera misteriosa que se revela en los colores añorados. La luz tropical igual ilumina con gracia las ruinas o la exuberante naturaleza que la retoma en minutos.
This exhibition has a retrospective character going back over 30 years of work, and shows something of the process of synthesizing the landscape to evolve into an abstract alphabet. Through Victor Fuenmayor’s critical text we can follow the process of the developing abstract alphabet and the reconstruction of this landscape with these symbols.
Víctor Fuenmayor, Maracaibo, November 25, 2016
Initially I perceive in Natalya Critchleys work (England 1963) a spatial disorder that draws me in as I unravel a code of signs that combine as text, articulating unusual ways of perceiving the urban and industrial landscape. All true creation begins with a deconstruction or creative destruction that leads us to create new ways of writing and new readings. Natalya Critchley invents a new landscape, recreating it imaginatively, which prompts a search for her codes for reading.
Continue reading “Crookedfield says Hi to Henry Hair Mattress: part 3”
Jimmy Yánez, Exhibition Curator, November 26, 2016
Whether the creation starts with an alphabet constructed from a spatial vision of the urban and natural landscape, or a web of forms and colours like a carpet, Natalya Critchley creates a unique poetic model from her texts.
As we are dealing with a retrospective exhibition, we will show this creative model in variety of media and materials throughout her career, with a convergence of forms in a constant crisscrossing of lines, like maps where we can imagine her writing with letters from her alphabet, an intercrossing of threads and metaphors repeated in her textual creation between geographical reference and the unique imaginary existent in the artists epoch.
Continue reading “Crookedfield says hi to Henry Hair Mattress: part 2”
The name of my exhibition at Maczul (Museum of Contemporary Art, Maracaibo, Venezuela) opening on Saturday 26th of November refers to my longstanding admiration for Henri Matisse as something of an insider joke. Henry Hair Mattress was the name which Chicago students christened him with in their protest against the 1913 Armory Show, which travelled from New York to Chicago and where 80% of the city came to see this scandalous exhibition of modern art. Crookedfield is a rendition of my surname.
Continue reading “Crookedfield says Hi to Henry Hair Mattress”
Natalya Critchley 