Programming

INTERVENTIONS

July 20, 2019

Helena Martin Franco

ALTÉROPHILIE ou Les Jeux de Force de Fritta Caro | Second occupation : PUTTING THE SHOULDER

Fritta Caro picks up the weightlifter's first movements, to create the Altero(s)philie; a treaty on the love of others.

Second occupation : METTRE L’ÉPAULE

Parc des Hommes-Forts, (intersection of de Courcelles and Saint-Antoine Ouest, Saint-Henri) July 20, 2019 at 1:00 p.m. (duration approximately 45 minutes)

Altérophilie ou Les jeux de force de Fritta Caro (Weightlifting or Fritta Caro's strength games) include a series of performances, including the second METTRE L’ÉPAULE (Putting the Shoulder) movement, which proposes a new occupation of the Parc des Hommes-Forts in which Fritta Caro's strength games will test the identities it summons.
Inspired by Louis Cyr, whose homage monument dominates the Parc des Hommes-Forts in Montreal, Fritta Caro takes the first movements of the weightlifter, L’ARRACHÉ (the snatch) and the clean-and-thrown, to create the Altero(s)philie; a manifesto on the love of others. Her proposal includes a tutorial and a new occupation of the park located in the heart of the St-Henri district. These different actions combined aim to highlight the force plays present in the use of stereotypes that lead to the construction of new identities.
In the summer of 2018, Fritta Caro performed in this same place L'ARRACHÉ, the first movement, in which she tried to thwart the categories that await her: woman, artist, immigrant, person of color, Latino, diversity artist, invisible minority, citizen of foreign origin. A year later, she returns to the Parc des Hommes-Forts with her luggages filled with doubts and new questions.
For the realization of the second movement; METTRE L’ÉPAULE (Putting the Shoulder) *, she chose the date of July 20, national holiday of her country of origin, Colombia. She offers us here a new occupation of the Parc des Hommes-Fort, which she will transform as she pleases into workshop space. For her last outing in this busy place, Fritta Caro will dialogue national identities and gender stereotypes, with a special guest: "The apron of the incarnated" highly symbolic object, carrying his emotional memory and a part of the contemporary history of Colombia. Between the encounter, the overlap and the dissonance, the actions perpetrated by the artist will open gaps in these monuments and emblems representative of distinct nations and strongly established symbols.
* Put the shoulder; variation of the name of the second movement, putting the shoulder is also the translation of the Colombian expression “Meter el hombro” which means to engage in the action.

- L'araignée

Helena Martin Franco, born in Cartagena, Colombia, lives and works in Montreal since 1998. With a master's degree in visual and media arts from the University of Quebec in Montreal, she is actively involved in the network of artist-run centers in Montreal. She is part of several visual art dissemination collectives, including one in Quebec : L'Araignée. From a gender perspective, she creates links between these collectives and cultural organizations in order to promote the encounter and exchange of artistic practices, especially between Canada and Colombia. Her interdisciplinary practice explores the mixing of different artistic processes and the hybridization between traditional techniques and new technologies. Her work revolves around the questioning that identity mutations raise in immigration circles. Her work has been presented in the Dominican Republic, Spain, New Zealand, Colombia, the United States, Argentina, Cuba and Quebec.