Doble Desgaste, 2005.
Detail: Doble Desgaste.
Doble Desgaste (Double Waste) 2005 . . . speaks to a striking ephemerality. In this transformative piece, the artists systematically drew the portrait of a handheld eraser, which he then proceeded to erase with the same eraser, starting over on the same piece of paper until both eraser and its double (portrait) were gone. Each stage of the dwindling eraser was documented with a photo, making in total 120 photos. When initially coming across this splendidly compact allegory of vanity, I was dazzled by what I deemed to be its status as the self-erasing masterpiece par excellence, and yet strictly speaking the case, engendering, as it does, an accumulated archive of its own methodical elimination.
Above text: Chris Sharp
Taken from exhibition guide.
The history of this piece of paper is recorded by photography, but the process seems to be encased in the paper; surely the repeated use of erasure must leave some mark, if only damage on the paper? I find it intriguing that the piece progresses with the destruction of its subject - that one has an adverse affect on the other. Its strikes me there is a poignant loyalty to the clear depiction of something. The repeated rubbing and removing, its self-consumption, reminds me a little of the endeavour of Auerbach's drawn portraits where prolonged energy and commitment to the subject would often work through the paper until it was left pitted. Such happenings however would not bring the end; continuance would come with repapering the reverse until it was strong enough to continue. In some ways this seems the inverse of the rational, methodical system of Arial Orozco who's piece is not the residue, but the revelation of the process from opening to culmination.
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