aleta Valente

Aleta Valente has a endless habit of playing with our expectations. Many of her self-portraits are surprising for flirting with stereotypes of femininity – although to the careful eye these are somehow being subverted – such as the constant eroticization of the female body or the insatiable use of the female nude in art. In this sense, in “No Man's Land” the nude shines through its absence. A mesh-up between Goya's “La maja desnuda” and the iconic Pistoletto “Venere delli stracci” of Arte Povera (both works made by men, in which the female nude is the protagonist), here we only see the figure of the artist, buried by the area that seems to be a whole room drowning this woman. It is a total denial of the expectations dictated by the domestication imposed on our bodies, which requires us to be clean, orderly, beautiful and peaceful women. The surrounding area suggests a possible internal hurricane. The typical muse pose covered by chaos proposes a dichotomy that is made even more tangible by the role of the colors from the different backgrounds of the diptych: Which version of Aleta are you prepared to face?

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- Dandara Catete