Nano Abia: Fantasmas otra vez

Something that repeats itself does so because it existed before, although in our case, perhaps it never ceased to do so. To pronounce a word is to make it true, just as to exist spectrally is to do so regardless. The ghostly is something we cannot easily classify: a bodiless entity between presence and absence. Like a shadow, the ghost lives, draining our lymphatic system, waiting for the right moment to detach and be free to rediscover the universe as a strange ectoplasm.

Nano's studio is in La Elipa, a neighborhood in Madrid that, among other things, houses the Almudena cemetery. When I go to see him, I usually make a stop there. That the cemetery is a place that inspires fear instead of being a type of park where one can have metaphysical picnics saddens me. How much these multitudes of souls have been perverted in the name of Christianity; if we could ask them, they would surely want to dance with us.

Upon entering his studio, I find several canvases and boards hanging on the walls in a circular arrangement. They seem fixed, but they are floating; they are stable and can be moved with ease. I am cornered by sketchy backgrounds, hollow teeth, dull eyes, words that squeak before they are spoken. It is like a sacred ritual dance where images struggle to appear. If I were alone in the gloom, I'd be terrified, but Nano has no fear of death, and it rubs off on you.

In Spanish, the word 'ghost' (fantasma) derives from the Greek φάντασμα (phántasma), meaning 'apparition' or 'image'. This Greek term is related to the verb φαίνειν (phaínein), meaning 'to shine', 'to show', or 'to appear'. To prepare an exhibition is exactly this: to make something appear before other people, to open a door between our dream and the dream of others. Sometimes I don't dare to speak of fantasy as the opposite of reality, that supposedly tangible perception. The non-apparent and the supernatural also affect us, so how can we not think that the real and tangible are, in reality, a chimera? Nano inoculates a jocular confusion with his work; the balloons seem soft but they are hard. It is all a good-natured joke at the hands of an unruly ghost.

In the studio, in order to work in the spray painting area, you have to go through a maze of several darkened rooms until you reach the lightbox. On arrival, I guide myself with the flashlight on my phone. However, when the day is over, I usually forget it at the entrance, so I have to grope my way back. This contrasts with the hours I've spent being very careful not to mess anything up. So fussy about the speck of dust, and now I'm back to sorting the balloons that, strung on metal rods on the ground, are waiting to be dry so they can embrace each other in a perfect balance as well as tense. Others will be pierced by arrows, tied with ropes, or supported by sticks, but all bear traces of humanity. Just listen to the bony sound they make when they touch each other or look at their knots, a sort of neonatal umbilical cord.

The weeks when I help Nano, I forget about my work and give myself to the hard things that seem soft, as opposed to my own, which seem hard but are soft. The sandpaper with which we perfect the surface of the balloon sculptures always shows ghostly motifs; they are Belmez faces in eternal movement. At the end of the day, I place them on the table and get ready to read messages from beyond the grave. Could they be the souls of those buried in the Almudena cemetery? Could the ghosts be figures that disturb the everyday in a sort of endless struggle and rebirth of apparitions that return again and again?

There are ghosts that haunt us, disguised as shadows, that do not dissipate at the opening; on the contrary, they grow larger every time a new spectator connects with a piece. It is in this last instant that a double trick is played on the board: terror and ecstasy perform clairvoyance before the void, as when you walk towards the sunset of a summer sun and suddenly turn to contemplate your shadow. It grows obscene with every step, and suddenly you remember that soon the light will fade, and you will be what you are again: a future ghost.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.
I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I've a call.

[...]

And like the cat I have nine times to die.
This is Number Three.
What a trash
To annihilate each decade.

[...]

Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.
Excerpts “Lady Lazarus” by Sylvia Plath