BARCELONA, SPAIN.-The Joan Miró Foundation is presenting the first one-man show in Spain by the Argentinean artist Sebastián Díaz Morales, as part of the Once upon a time... cycle selected by Marie-Thérèse Champesme and Pascale Pronnier. The exhibition will be held in parallel with the one by Laura Henno and will be in Room 15. Sebastián Díaz Morales (Comodoro Rivadavia, Argentina, 1975) studied film-making in Argentina and later spent time at Le Fresnoy, where his project was the installation that can now be seen in the Espai 13: The Man with the Bag.

The artist describes his work as follows: “A man is running desperately through the desolate landscape of Patagonia, carrying all his belongings in a bag. As he runs he loses the things he is carrying. They escape from his fears, from the sounds behind him of the wind and the dogs. But he continues to head on in the same direction.” This simple story, says the artist, contains the essence of human existence, metaphorically speaking.

Each action and each object represented in the video is a metaphor that is open to multiple interpretations. The viewer accompanies the man and feels his anxieties, transported along by events. The sensation is accentuated by the line that divides the image into two halves that do not always match and that recreate the man’s various perceptions. The soundtrack too, coming from four directions, adds to the effect of immersion. The sound of the wind in Patagonia, which is the region in which the artist was born and where he shot the video, has the same role as the landscape to which it is inextricably linked.

The sound of the wind alternates with the music by Simeon ten Holt, repeated in a loop. This gives force to the desolate image of the landscape that is always the same, and adds to the exasperation of the situation and of the figure.

Immersed in the landscape, enveloped by the sound and experiencing the events, the viewer could be the one pursuing the man – or perhaps the viewer is also being pursued.