To understand how local artists shape the material to extract their vision of the world, you have to meet them. Mise en Lumière is a series of portraits that appears every end of the month. Forays into the world of creators who work on their works in unusual ways, away from current cultural events.
In María Ezcurra’s studio, wherever we look, the idea of movement arises. In the back room, suitcases. In another, a collection of merchandise packaging that has crossed continents. Near a window, one of the birds created from shoes. And a great heron drawn in real size overlooks the table where the interview takes place.
Migration is a subject inherent to her practice, explains the woman born in Argentina, who grew up and became a mother in Mexico, now based in Montreal, in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. Even the choice of his materials, often worn – “they have a history” – is colored by the question. The great blue heron and its ilk which make up an exhaustive list of migratory birds are drawn on recycled cardboard.
“It fascinates me to know that these boxes have traveled,” she says. In my works, I link personal stories and social, political and commercial issues. This is obvious when I use suitcases. This is also present with the boxes. »
In the summer of 2022, people who stopped at the Adélard center in Frelighsburg discovered the project Aves migratorias neotropical. While in creative residency, María Ezcurra drew her aves (birds). She worked surrounded by boxes, including small, white, leftover nylon stocking wrappers. Since then, more precisely since the previous spring and “the passport crisis » — as chance would have it, his Zapájaros (fusion of shoes and birds) float above the lines in front of the passport office of the Guy-Favreau complex — she exhibits, exhibits, exhibits.
In the summer of 2023, she obtained her first solo in Quebec (Liminal. Stretch the margins, Casa Project), thirteen years after landing there with spouse and children. These days, the National Museum of Fine Arts of Quebec honors her, along with four other women — the exhibition Art prizes current of the MNBAQ 2023. For the occasion, his suitcases revealed in Liminal made the trip.
“It’s been a very good year, I’m not complaining. However, I have a file called “Refusal”. It’s huge,” she exclaims.
Numerous refusals, she knows, are the lot of an artistic career. She admits that her first years in Montreal were not a great success, in terms of visibility. For educational reasons — a doctorate at Concordia University — she had left Mexico City when her business was going well. Migrating will have been synonymous with a return to square one. “Emerging artist. Almost 40,” she chuckles, relieved that the second career has taken off.
Reversible material
Skilled with her hands, and not only for drawing very realistic birds, María Ezcurra has made a name for herself with installations composed of women’s underwear (nylon stockings and the like). It is her favorite material, which she deforms and stretches. She buys stockings in large quantities, hence the packages displayed in the workshop, but does not wear them, she says. She has a love-hate relationship towards this very gendered piece of clothing. Soft and practical material, heavy on stereotypes.
“One of my works talks about the violence suffered by our bodies under the pretext of protecting them or meeting beauty standards. We use stockings to avoid being attacked, not to be judged. But they do not provide shelter and are very uncomfortable. »
Violence against women marked María Ezcurra during her Mexican career — “what else would we talk about?” » she asks herself. Her first installation with stockings, in 2003, responded to the phenomenon of feminicides in Ciudad Juárez, in the north of the country — the work Neither one more [pas une de plus]also seen at the Optica center, in 2020.
She, who fears the blank sheet of paper above all else, has adopted clothing (stockings, shoes and other pieces made by her hand) as an object of art. It offers more than one layer of reading, allows you to hang on to something. “The textile material is reversible,” she adds. You can work and start again if it doesn’t work. It’s a very rich dialogue, not just a monologue imposed by the artist. »
Heavy weights
María Ezcurra draws, sews, manipulates… And collects, thanks to the Marketplace and Renaissance of this world, her shoes and suitcases. Rocks too, which she found by chance the first time as waste around a construction site. The mineral took on great importance in two installations in 2019, Tension And Synapseand not just for fixing nylon fabrics.
“I like the accidental. The rocks stabilize, for good and for bad, she says, about these works which speak of identity. We need stability and at the same time it is a heavy weight. Everyone experiences it, but more so us immigrants. We try to move forward by carrying rocks. »
Time and good relationships ended up moving María Ezcurra forward. Thanks to the voices of diversity (Nuria Carton de Grammont, Laura Vigo, Stanley Février, among others), she is aware of having benefited from a momentum. “I try to use this visibility and participate in something collective,” says the woman who gets involved in transmitting her knowledge in workshops.
Her work, she admits with humility, is more about sharing than teaching. “Taking a step back from lived experiences is what I invite you to do. To show that something that is barely visible can be seen. » Her arrival in Montreal helped her take this step back, this repositioning without which she would have stagnated.