Women in Art 121- Lucy Gans

RESEARCH PAPER 1

EL BOTE- RAMOS LORENZO, SANDRA

Introduction

Sandra Ramos Lorenzo is a Cuban contemporary painter, printmaker, collagist, and installation artist who explores nationality, gender, and identity in her work. This piece is designed to elicit an emotional response of leaving native home behind in efforts to conquer new aspirations through etched storytelling.

What initially attracted me to this print is the initial sense of isolation being abandoned at sea but the glistening stars bring about a vague feeling of hope related to this journey that is presented. Reading more about the artist and her personal identity made the choice pretty clear to me we have a shared ethnic, historic and ancestry experience. The hardships of her childhood and being from a place of dictatorship is what propelled the content of her work, it is vulnerable, riveting and unique.

In the print shown, etched on paper is what I believe to be her self portrait of her leaving her native country Cuba which is now behind her as she faces forward the new journey/escape of coming to America. This etching was published 1994, a very prominent time for many Cubans who had dreams and missions to flee the island under Fidel Castro’s control. 

In many pieces Ramos Lorenzo uses one common motif in her work a character named Ariadne. Ariadne is a young girl whose visage seems innocent, guiltiness, and unaware of life’s struggles. Ariadne the character is actually said to be the self-portrait of herself as she reflects back to her younger self transforming this piece into a surrealist inspection complex. 

In the etching it is clear that Ariadne is at sea conquering her fears, the waves and leaving all else that is left behind her… her home Cuba and potentially her family as she is seen venturing on her own here. The red overalls and blue bandana are very patriotic to what her culture and all she is taking with her to this new place as she looks forward into the darkness lit by a line of stars. Also what seems to be bottles in the water (could be letters in them) symbolize the lives of lost individuals who have taken on this journey before through tortuous waters all for the fight for independence and freedom. The artist has also decided to spotlight the middle of the etching which further exemplifies, the restoration of her memory of those individuals who dream of continents, who dream of a day they get to arm their boats with means of hope, longing, triumph, and flight-under the sign of impossibility of their journey just like her. Ultimately some could never get rid of the cursed and perverse circumstance of water engulfing them everywhere transcending into fallen angels which are exemplified in this piece as the stars and bottles. The individuals who have passed on their journey are the castaways, who, searching for life, found a grave in death, and that exact ocean graveyard Sandra seeks shelters in the safe harbor of their poetic testimonies.

On the safe harbor Aridane is perched on the edge of the boat the audience can tell there is bleeding of color/water onto the paper that gives this piece more life. The spotlight of the circle light right in the center of the piece is designed to drive focus and attention to the character and the emptiness of the harbor that she is in whilst highlighting the depths of her isolation. The lines of the ocean waves flow in an organized rhythmic but yet unstill manner just like her. 

(sources: https://www.sandraramosart.com/bio/texts/137-yssel-arce-alguien-tiene-que-despertar-al-avestruz-revista-revolucion-y-cultura-no-6-2000, “Sandra Ramos Interview 2012, 7 May”)