Visual artist from Santiago, Chile, with an MA in Visual Arts from Universidad de Chile. Her work mainly focuses on three general concepts: repetition, material transformation and multiplicity, all of them under the eaves of the continuous contradiction and dualities to which we are exposed. Everything can be perceived in multiple forms and can go through an infinite variety of interpretation. Even beyond, we are corporal and mental multiplicity.

Bernardita understands repetition as a mayor contradiction, due to the possibility and impossibility of it. Time passes and it’s gone; yet, we constantly repeat, day-to-day. We can repeat shapes, images, objects, acts. Music and theatre are pure repetition.  What varies, what makes repetition impossible are the different manifestations of the essential. She thinks of repetition in several ways, such as: a validation of thoughts and feelings towards others and ourselves; repetition as a searching method for comprehension; repetition as an illusion of order and control. Foremost, repetition as a mimesis of the cyclic movements and ways of the Universe, consequently, endless repetition.

She holds a very intimate relationship with materials. Therefore, she manipulates them in order to discover their possibilities of transformation, remove their functional origin with the expectation of expanding them and proceed on the intangible. Essence and material are somehow forced to co-exist.

During her participation in Despina Residency Programme she will be working on a project called “Pending Images”, which consists in developing several projects and images that haven’t been yet materialized. As well, is highly important including the local context and perspectives that are implied for living the three months Residency in Rio de Janeiro.

More information
http://bbertelsenm.wix.com/bernardita-bertelsen

Pictures Gallery