Alexandra Masson's Artist Profile
Alexandra Masson from Caracas, Uruguay
i like artist
To translate… to take what exists and transform it and thereby transmit a message, communicate feelings that cannot be boxed in by words… express not with words but through tangible staff, as another way to communicate the scars of the soul and enter into contact with what is outside, everything that surrounds us and which sometimes invades us… or not… the subtle environment that cannot be touched… Art as a tool to understand how the psyche works, to carry out a process of rearrangement and digestion and comprehension which is later expressed in works with feeling and that may possibly generate new meanings. This was the idea which motivated me to convert garbage into beauty –perhaps my inner garbage into outer beauty- by joining broken pieces, using cold feminine ceramic tiles on warm masculine wood to unify the internal broken pieces and create something external that is not-so-broken, stuck on with plaster of paris, an allusion to the icing on cakes, something tasty and sweet. Corroborate the beauty in the garbage external/internal, as a way of approximation to other human beings to see how much coincidence – or not – there is in the perceptions and sentiments. Paraphrasing the words of American writer Susan Sontag, ¨Permanence…is not one of the more evident attributes of beauty. In art –as opposed to life – it is not considered that beauty has to be necessarily visible, evident, obvious. Notwithstanding how much art appears to be an issue of surfaces and sensory reception, art has become the recipient, in general, of an honorary citizenship in the domain of ¨internal¨ beauty —as opposed to the "external" one. Beauty would thus be immutable, at least when it has incarnated —has been set— under the form of art, because it is in art where beauty as an idea —an eternal idea— incarnates the best. What matters is to find beauty in what had not heretofore been perceived as beautiful (or beauty within ugliness)¨. Alexandra Masson
Artist's Statement
To translate… to take what exists and transform it and thereby transmit a message, communicate feelings that cannot be boxed in by words… express not with words but through tangible staff, as another way to communicate the scars of the soul and enter into contact with what is outside, everything that surrounds us and which sometimes invades us… or not… the subtle environment that cannot be touched… Art as a tool to understand how the psyche works, to carry out a process of rearrangement and digestion and comprehension which is later expressed in works with feeling and that may possibly generate new meanings. This was the idea which motivated me to convert garbage into beauty –perhaps my inner garbage into outer beauty- by joining broken pieces, using cold feminine ceramic tiles on warm masculine wood to unify the internal broken pieces and create something external that is not-so-broken, stuck on with plaster of paris, an allusion to the icing on cakes, something tasty and sweet. Corroborate the beauty in the garbage external/internal, as a way of approximation to other human beings to see how much coincidence – or not – there is in the perceptions and sentiments. Paraphrasing the words of American writer Susan Sontag, ¨Permanence…is not one of the more evident attributes of beauty. In art –as opposed to life – it is not considered that beauty has to be necessarily visible, evident, obvious. Notwithstanding how much art appears to be an issue of surfaces and sensory reception, art has become the recipient, in general, of an honorary citizenship in the domain of ¨internal¨ beauty —as opposed to the "external" one. Beauty would thus be immutable, at least when it has incarnated —has been set— under the form of art, because it is in art where beauty as an idea —an eternal idea— incarnates the best. What matters is to find beauty in what had not heretofore been perceived as beautiful (or beauty within ugliness)¨. Alexandra Masson
Alexandra Masson) was born in Kent, England on December 2, 1960. She is British, resident in Venezuela since 1974. She studied her primary education in Argentina and Trinidad. At an early age she started to develop her artistic interests linked to plastic arts with organic materials such as ants´ nests, creating a manner of clay with which she used to form various figures. Later on she took private drawing and painting lessons. She studied high school in Caracas and started her university studies in Biology at Universidad Simón Bolívar. She switched to simultaneous interpreting, which she concluded at the extension of free studies at Universidad Central de Venezuela. In 1988 she went to live in London for two years, where she broadened her plastic knowledge at the theoretical level by means of a personal method consisting of regular visits to museums, art galleries and art lectures, which she continued to do in several cities in Europe, Egypt and upon her return to Caracas. Back in Venezuela she developed and consolidated her professional career which enabled her to have the freedom to take up once again her interest in the plastic arts. In November 1995 she entered a painting for the Lagoven Art Salon and was awarded the Single Prize in the Category of Beginners or New Artists. She continued her Studies at the Cristobal Rojas school of arts and in May 2008 she attended a seminar entitled ¨Metaphor and Creativity¨, by philosopher Lizette Nava, where she met international artist Ricardo Benaím, who helped reactivate her interest in expressing herself. In October 2008 she took a workshop on Esthetics: Art and Society, at the Centro Cultural Chacao given by sociologist Gerardo Zavarce, in which she incorporated the sense of otherness and togetherness the artist has with society at large. Her first art exhibit opened on January 22, 2009 at the Coffee & Art Restaurant in Altamira, Caracas. March 2009: IX Art Night in Santa Lucía, Maracaibo State, Venezuela. Participation with the artists from the Atheneum of Valencia. May 2009: participation in ¨Suiche Urbano¨ event, including 31 up-and-coming artists at Universidad Monteávila, Caracas, Venezuela. July 2009: artwork accepted at the XXVI AVAP Guárico Art Salon, Guárico, Venezuela. September 2009: XIIth edition of Contemporary Latin American Art, Museum of the Americas, Broward College, Pembroke Pines, Florida, USA. October 2009: 35 postcards sent for the Mailart exhibit at Elder Street Gallery, Houston, Texas. February 2010: 7th. Show Rescue of Drawing "Carlos Serfaty", homage to the Guacara Foundation, Atheneum of Guacara, Venezuela April 27 – May 8, 2010: Participation in international art project ¨A Book About Death¨, Museum of Modern Art of Wales (MOMA Wales), United Kingdom August 2010: Participation with a digital photo “Psychodelic Orchid” at a collective show called 100sqft at the Cholmsey Boys Club, London, England. 17 October 2010-15 January 2011: Participation at the VIII Dycvensa Arts Salon, Celarg, Caracas, Venezuela 19 November -18 December 2010: One of the 62 artists selected from among 600 artists to participate at the I Biennale of Contemporary Art ULA Merida, Venezuela 24 February - 17 March, 2011: Individual exhibit of photos of Angkor Wat, Siem Reap, Cambodia at the Alliance Francaise, La Tahona, Caracas, Venezuela 4 to 6 March, 2011: 11th Velada de Santa Lucía, Maracaibo, participation in collective show ¨Blurred Territory: Freedom and self-portrait¨ organized by artist Eliseo Solís Mora