Alfred Martinez
2nd phase of the “The Digital Pilgrim” project
On the first week of June I will be in France researching the 2nd phase of the “The Digital Pilgrim” project. In 2010 I exhibited the “The Digital Pilgrim” collage wall installation at the M55 Art Gallery. The imagery depicted events, people, and regional Romanesque architecture from northern Spain. This hike through central France aims to visit and study the Romanesque relief sculpture which contributed greatly to Western figurative and decorative religious imagery. Places like Vezaley, Autun, Conques produced unique relief sculpture in the history of Western visual language. My motivation is to see how some of these ideas translate into my own media for creating painting narratives with subjective imagery.
Wall Collage Digital Pilgrimage
A Pilgrimage Through Spain: imagery from a cultural process…2009
This past summer I walked almost 500 miles across northern Spain, starting on the French side of the Pyrenees mountains at the town of Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port. The next morning I hiked a crossed the high track to Roncesvalles in Spain. The route is known as, “The Way of St. James”, and it leads to the northwestern city of Santiago de Compostela. The destination path follows villages, woods, plateaus, vineyards, churches and city cathedrals much as it did a thousand years ago. It was done originally to gain religious salvation. Many people still do it as a religious venture. And many people-a lot of them young, in their twenties- do it for other reasons; to feel some subjective significance or to be part of a contemporary cultural process. I think my reason follows this latter perspective. Being an artist, I spent a lot of time taking pictures of images which captivated my imagination. I took pictures of people who were highly motivated by walking such a vast distance just to get to a place that most of them had never seen before. This people came from different countries, spoke different languages, where of different cultures, and they all came with an incredible determination, to reach -through this often physically brutal walk-the destination of Santiago and to feel a sense of personal achievement. I saw this as a human value, a contemporary activity of culture. The European Union has labeled this pilgrimage track, as the “First Official European Cultural Itinerary”. It certainly is a unique on going process. The news here is, that this ancient trail which I walked and many other people are walking, is I think a kind of human phenomena. Considering the pessimism which many people feel about their lives and their futures; what I experienced on El Camino was a community of individuals feeling good about being personally subjective and deriving human motivation by being active in their lives. I produced a large quantity of pictures during this trip which I am appreciating as a source for new images in my art language. For now, this entire experience has taken on a kind of imprint to my creative way of thinking.