Fantastic Pseudology

FANTASTIC PSEUDOLOGY

The exhibition takes its name from a psychological disorder characterized by an uncontrollable urge to tell fantasized stories that the subject ends up believing. The individual's goal is to obtain admiration, compassion, recognition, or protection from others, without lying per se constituting a primary pleasurable stimulus. 

Some real events are intertwined with elaborate fantasies. The patient may be driven by an uncontrollable and unhealthy tendency to lie. This occurs in pathological personalities and is probably related to low self-esteem and lack of impulse control.

In the artist's words, this phenomenon ties in with her work because it helps explain her use of archives: "I make their materialsmy ownand offer completely different versions that have nothing to do with the intention with which they were created."

THE SERIES

De Middel tells us that "Afronautsis based on the documentation of an impossible dream that only lives in images. Based on this incredible but true news story from 50 years ago, I reconstruct the scenes that could have documented it at the time and reinforce its veracity by adding my personal feelings and the fruit of my imagination to that certainty."

Following the success ofAfronautas, the artist traveled to China, where she lived for six months and conceived Party. The proposal is based on Mao's Little Red Book and articulates a presentation about the country through censorship. To do this, she transformed the texts that were supposed to be the basis of good Chinese citizen thinking into a kind of humorous and ironic poem that, for her, "serves much better to navigate today's Chinese society."

In 2015, the artist acquired the archive of a Mexican crime newspaper from the 1920s called Alerta!, through which she invites us on a journey to the "Center of the Earth," a journey through images and drawings set to the rhythm of narcocorrido music, which gave rise to the Cucurrucucú series. The starting point for the series was to explore the different languages of violence and the role of photography in this field. The result of this work, which combines photography, drawing, comic strips, rancheras, and more, was the photobook of the same name, which received the 2016 Photobook of the Year Award.

An archive is constructed with the intention of organizing and grouping existing elements, giving them an order to facilitate their location. WithAleatoris Vulgaris, her project Tender Puentes (Building Bridges) inspired by the Museum's collection, the artist challenges this very logic. Using a system for registering collection pieces, the project plays with the creation of random algorithms using the most disparate means of selection and registration.

Cristina De Middel's work explores the ambiguous relationship between photography and truth. She combines documentary and conceptual approaches, playing with the reconstruction of archetypes and stereotypes that help blur the line between reality and fiction, and suggests that we take a critical look at the way reality is presented to us. On this occasion, she invites us to explore several ideas: expedition and travel, the culture of violence in Mexico, and the impossibility of randomness.

Cristina de Middel Winner of the 2017 National Photography Award and curator of PhotoEspaña 2018. In 2017, she was invited to join the international Magnum agency. After initially working as a photojournalist for various media outlets, she now develops artistic projects in which she plays with the boundaries between reality and fiction.

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