MEMORIES | MARA PALENA

Mara Palena uses primarily the photographic medium, sometimes combined with video and sound, to investigate and challenge human emotions in relation to time, memory, and identity. Drawing from both present and past personal experiences, the artist explores the concepts of remembrance and individuality, aiming to establish a collective and shared emotional connection.

Memories (2022) is a digital collage of technical images – a term used to more precisely define photographs as ‘computations of concepts’ – born from introspective analysis materialized through artificial intelligence. This AI is fed with Molly Bloom’s words, wife of Leopold Bloom, the main character in James Joyce’s book “Ulysses”.

Physically, Palena’s artwork consists of a printed image positioned behind a layer of plexiglass: displayed to the world yet simultaneously protected by a transparent barrier.
At the first glance, Memories has the ability to captivate the viewer with the intriguing whirlwind of its visual elements. While initially appearing as a simple collage, the closer one examines it, the more it becomes involved or overwhelmed by this heterogeneous collection of data and fragments, some familiar, others unrecognizable.
The gaze wanders from one part of the image to another, attempting to distinguish its forms and assign meaning to what is seen. However, much like Molly Bloom’s uninterrupted stream of thoughts in the book, it never finds a definitive endpoint, never exhausts its search, and is continually stimulated by newly discovered elements.

Everything revolves around human existence: the artist, the tool which is a ‘thinking machine’ created by humans, the text that fuels this medium produced by human hands. An infinite loop, a vortex that always returns to its origin, namely the very existence of the human being and their attempt to leave a trace.

With the intention of offering the viewer a more immersive sensory experience, Palena completes the installation of this artwork with music – downloadable via QR code – also created by an artificial intelligence fed with the following words: ‘I Feel it Everywhere I go – Memories’.

Mara Palena
Memories, 2022
Fine art print enclosed in plexiglass, 50 x 35 cm
Courtesy the artist and Nowhere Gallery, Milan

17/02/2024