The solo show "To Whom it May Concern'" by Isabella K. Cancino that opens at VLAB from December 1 to 31 features 20 drawings of which eight paintings are dedicated to tell a story between a girl and a flower.
Cancino finds in literature, especially in children's literature, an absolute source of inspiration, as shown in this series of drawings that take us back in just an instant to our childhood, seeing our inner child holding a comic book or watching cartoons on TV.
In this story Isabella reveals through graphite the uniqueness of the bonds we create. At the beginning we observe an angry and lonely protagonist, pushing the furniture aside as if everything that is not what she has just lost is in her way. We do not see her face but only her shadow, she does not want to let herself be known.
The story continues and we can see her face, she is looking out the window thinking about what happened while washing the dishes to which she pays no attention, the water faucet remains open. She realizes she' s angry, hence the title "Mad, for sure" but this scene is held by hands on a crumpled rag, as if there was not much left for her to get rid of that thought as easily as someone gets rid of a rag.
Wanting to abandon old habits and forget people who are no longer there often leads us to change the aesthetics of what is part of our daily life: cutting our hair, getting a tattoo or painting our house are clear examples. In this case our nameless protagonist opts for the last one, entitled 'To edify', she reflects that it is possible to build another life within one's own.
It is easy to relapse into sadness, to think that we will never be able to trust someone again after they have hurt us, to believe that while we suffer no one else does, it is even tempting. The main character could have closed the curtains and forgotten about that dying flower, or taken comfort in seeing that someone else is worse off than she is, but this is not the case.
Then, she receives the flower and offers it a safe place, which implies the end of its solitude but also having to teach it to adapt to a new life, to another space, in short, and reminding us Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's book "The Little Prince", 1943, it means having to tame it and that it allows itself to be tamed. The beginning of a bond that did not exist until then.
It works. Around the flower we find a light that indicates that it shines, and therefore it is happy. Both hold hands as if they were dancing, look at each other, recognize each other and thank each other for what has happened. It is no longer raining.
The flower definitely gave hope back to our protagonist, it was an internal growth and therefore she continues to take care of it and plant new flowers that someday will be as big as her. They do not replace her, they accompany her and fill her life with meaning.
We reach the end of this story with a moral "The only things you learn are the things you tame" and it is by taking care and dedicating time to what matters to us that we really learn, grow and maintain them.
