Freisy Gonzalez | A Star In A Sea Wave
A broken letter found in one of the ruins, from a mother asking for help and building materials from the Mayor of the area, in order to build a house for her two children. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
La Guaira is the coast closest to the city of Caracas in Venezuela, and one of the oldest and most important ports in the country, especially during the eighteenth century, as the center of trade operations, imports and exports of goods and fruits, such as cocoa, during those colonial years. However, years have passed and this territory seems to be the backyard of Caracas. A kind of paradise or tourist oasis that sometimes seems to have no history, a place of fragmented stories, and at the same time, a kind of dormitory city because of its airport; a place of many names, which seem to be changed, like someone who reinvents an identity, and makes a kind of clean slate.
Sculpture of Josefa Joaquina Sánchez, who would embroider the flag of one of the first independence movements in Venezuela, which took place in La Guaira, by Manuel Gual and José María España -Josefa was the latter's wife. Image that dialogues with this flash in a portrait of my older sister. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
A drawing of a sun on a family, that I did during my kindergarten, that seems to me to shine in the water of the beach where my mother and my older brothers bathed, even before I was born. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
All this is even more palpable in the streets of the historic center of La Guaira, and its current architectural recovery and restoration. Whose works make us reflect and question about memory, the present, identity, the political uses of historical sites and of history itself, the interference of the State and politicking -which can produce rejection in some people, cover up discontent and fall into excesses; the great lack of drinking water, the pain and traces of tragedies and river floods (the most serious and recent occurred in 1999), and on the other hand, the bluest skies, salsa music and the smiles of the thriving people who live in the lands of this old town, where all the streets reach the sea. I hope to tell a story of the historic center of La Guaira in its current state, through visual experimentation, starting from walks through its streets, looking for the generation of matrices and graphic material, through documents, papers, graffiti, and found objects, in its various buildings in ruins, a typography that works since the nineteenth century and conversations with its own inhabitants, which allowed me to somehow read this old town that I knew during my childhood.
Photomontage of typographic stamps of fishes, a photo of the sea near the old town of La Guaira. In the background, a piece of paper found in the ruins of one of the buildings, concerning customs operations. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
Fisherman walks along Calle Bolívar del Casco Historic, near Plaza Vargas with its Cojinúa and Medregal fishing. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
Photomontage of objects found in a ruined house near the Boulevar de los Pintores, photographed on a white background, as an inventory or contemporary archaeological record. These objects probably belonged to the family that lived there, which are mixed with the garbage thrown by the current inhabitants of nearby houses. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
A colonial painting and models of wooden ships in José María España and Manuel Gual’s house, important characters in Venezuela's quest for independence from the Spanish crown. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
A child plays with discarded Christmas lights. He plays at selecting them, on Bolivar street in La Guaira's Casco Historico. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
View from the Historic Center of La Guaira. Superimposed a typographic stamp of a sun. Freisy Gonzalez, 2024.
