Brands are unavoidable, whether in the city or countryside.
Far beyond a value judgment about them, the project seeks to show their presence in ourselves, to the point that we can remind, select and also reproduce them with our own stroke.
which is the first brand that comes to your mind?
“USTED MARCA” (in some sense could mean “you make a mark” or “you mark” or more literally “you brand”) was one of the several projects about brands I made in my private studio “USTED” (2006-2011)
The project aims to collect drawings made from different people either on paper or in digital format that match the question of “which is the first brand that pops up your mind?”
The first activity of this initiative was related to project “COLORS Notebook”, where one of the empty notebook from that renowned magazine was completed with drawings of brands made by various personalities from Uruguay. This book was sent to Colors in Italy in early 2007. The cover title and all the text in this notebook (name of author, age and name of the drew brand) were included with stamps.
During 2007 with the support of a teacher from two schools in different realities of Montevideo, I started this investigation with children.
They responded to this question with drawings made with fibers on A4 sized paper.
In late 2008 a selection of these drawings was showed as a part of a solo exhibition I developed in a commercial store (more fashionable brand at the time).
This place had better installations than cultural centres or art galleries in Uruguay, and the strong presence of their brand, helped to think about the topic in other way.
In this solo exhibition, among other works about brands, I have also presented a series of postcards of this project and a couple of computers. One with the chance of drawing the answer to the question, and the other one showing randomly the drawings that people made in the exhibition and also outside via internet.
view web site (to draw the first brand that pops up your mind)
view web site (to see the brands)
Acknowledges: Francisco Magnone (programmation for web sites), Mundo Mac Store (exhibition venue), Ximena Moraes (service during opening), Valeria (school teacher)