Juxtapoz Magazine – Tania Marmolejo “What Was Saved from the Fire” @ Loyal Gallery, Stockholm

Loyal Gallery in Stockholm is about to shut Tania Marmolejo‘s What Was Saved from the Hearth, a solo exhibition of twelve oil work put in over two flooring of the gallery. Earlier than the present comes down on July 8, we wished to share Tania’s essay concerning the present, which you’ll learn under. 

I’ve typically been requested which of my possessions I’d save from a fireplace, and with out hesitation I reply “My grandmother Elsa’s sketchbook”. It’s no doubt the possession that’s most connected to me emotionally, a compilation of drawings made by my Swedish maternal grandmother Elsa when she was a younger teenager, educating herself how to attract.

I sadly by no means met Elsa, she died earlier than I used to be born. Hearth is what tragically took her life, however fireplace can also be the fervour she had for artwork, that I really feel obtained handed all the way down to me and has related me to her in some ways. I used to be at all times fascinated by her drawings since I used to be a little bit woman, they usually have been the largest affect in my very own need to attract and paint. And although she was additionally a painter and mastered her craft, it was her sketchbook stuffed with cartoons that captivated my consideration probably the most.

A pissed off artist, Elsa wished as a younger lady that she might have studied artwork in Stockholm, however the financial and gender boundaries of the time prohibited her from doing so. Rising up in a house that totally supported my very own creative passions, and being allowed to check and to pursue artwork as a profession, I really feel I’m now fortunately liable for carrying on her dream someway. I really feel extremely humbled and proud that I’ve the possibility to indicate a few of my favourite of her sketches subsequent to my work, (in Stockholm!) and present how her story has come full circle.

The work I created for this exhibition replicate a nostalgia for my childhood summers spent in Sweden, the comfortable recollections that join me to my mom and grandmother’s homeland. I’ve added a few her little drawings to some work of mine to indicate the presence they’ve at all times had. Taking reference from previous images in using shade and temper, and in addition from the recollections and feelings that come from these moments, I’ve created an emotional and psychological dialog with Elsa (and hopefully with the viewer), of experiences I’d have appreciated to have shared together with her, an acknowledgement of what her artwork and being related to Sweden at all times meant to me, and an appreciation of how life might be such a fragile, fleeting, lovely factor. –Tania Marmolejo, Might 2023