The Center for Ongoing Research & Projects

Sabbatical (Year Two)

August 2014 - May 2015

The Center for Ongoing Research & Projects presents Sabbatical, an ongoing exhibition of missives and materials sent by artists and researchers on sabbatical around the world and shown within the artist’s home community. The exhibition contains artifacts of the artist’s field research, and it is regularly updated as new materials arrive.

During their sabbaticals in Madrid, OSU Professors Rebeka Campos-Astorkiza and Richard Fletcher will be developing their ongoing collaborative research project Spain from Here/España desde aquí. This project explores the complex issue of national identity by focusing on expatriated Spanish artists living and working in the USA. Just as any conception of a unified Spanish identity is challenged by the political autonomy and self-definition of numerous regions (e.g. Catalonia, the Basque Country, Galicia), so too is the idea of a homogenous experience of expatriate artists in the United States challenged by different approaches to artistic expression. Highlighting how artists negotiate contested national identities in terms of their expatriate status, the project will look beyond simplistic notions of nostalgia and loss for the homeland by emphasizing the potential for expatriate artists to offer a novel and revitalized perspective on entrenched debates of national identity within Spain.

As an extension of Spain from Here/España desde aquí, the two researchers will be joined by two Los Angeles-based contemporary artists– Patricia Fernández Carcedo and Erlea Maneros Zabala. By interchanging materials sent to the exhibition space from Madrid and Los Angeles respectively, both researchers and artists will collaborate within and across disciplinary borders through a network of conversations and exchanges grounded in the basic research questions of the project. Building on key questions of representation and documentation central to both artists’ practice and the themes of national identity and expatriate experience examined in Spain from Here/España desde aquí, this collaboration will offer a new approach to the role of information and its dissemination across artistic and academic settings. In sharing the exhibition space, the tension between how academics and artists explore their research questions in terms of their selection, creation and manipulation of their missives will be the starting point for future debate and discussion.

The works will be displayed from August 1st in the COR&P outpost on the 2nd floor of Hagerty Hall in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese (outside room HH 255) on the Ohio State University main campus.

About the Participants

Rebeka Campos-Astorkiza is associate professor of Hispanic Linguistics at the Ohio State University and holds a PhD in Linguistics from the University of Southern California. She works on phonetics and phonology, and is interested in how phonetic data can help us develop theoretical models to explain sound patterns.

Richard Fletcher is an associate professor in the Classics department at the Ohio State University and holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge. He works on a range of topics from Ancient Greek and Roman philosophy and Literature to Ancient Philosophy and Contemporary Art.

Patricia Fernández Carcedo is an artist who lives and works in Los Angeles. She studied at the Saint Martins School for Art and Design, London and received her BFA from UCLA and her MFA from the California Institute of the Arts. Her work uses walks, archives, ephemera, objects and paintings to explore ideas of memory and history across personal and political narratives.

Erlea Maneros Zabala is an artist who lives and works in Los Angeles. She received her BFA from the Glasgow School of Art and her MFA from the California Institute of the Arts. Her work involves the analysis, appropriation and manipulation of politically charged images and documents. She is represented by Carreras Múgica (Bilbao), Maisterravalbuena (Madrid) and Redling Fine Art (Los Angeles).

This project is presented in conjunction with The Ohio State University Department of Spanish and Portuguese.