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Exercises of memory: Ricardo Pons

Thoughts on the horror, thirty years after the coup

Ricardo Pons. Afterimages (2006)

Phosphene – a sensation of light caused by excitation of the retina by mechanical or electrical means rather than by light. Afterimage — An optical illusion that occurs after looking away from a direct gaze at an image. Due to the continuous photochemical activity in the retina upon watching a neuter background you will see a positive, negative or complementary image to that previously observed (stimulus).

They say that temporary interruption of the sight refines the quality of stimulus coming from the other senses commonly classified as secondary. This would be due to the release experienced by the perception channels that are usually saturated by “the” sense by antonomasia.

When a person is involuntarily blindfolded he/she usually reacts instinctively building a story in his mind that would be directed to a possible rescuer: trying to remember how long they drove for in minutes and at what speed, how many times the vehicle changed direction or stopped temporarily, if the road was bumpy or if it was possible to hear specific sounds or characteristic smells.

In those cases, sight only gives vague luminous stimulus, afterimages, indefinable color flashes, chromatic phosphorescent aberrations like those we perceive after being in a completely dark room for a few moments, trompe l’oeil of the retinal persistence phenomenon.

Captives are blindfolded to prevent them from recognizing the different places they go through: from the capture site to the place of detention, from the cell to the torture room. Bandages that are forced onto some and self-imposed by a great part of society that does not want to remember those uncomfortable trenches between dark spots of our recent history.

Ricardo Pons

By means of a composition of the images a blindfolded person could experience, the author tries to scan the mazes of recent history and bring them back to the present day. Metaphorically, this entails that not only the captured people, but society as a whole suffered the pressure of dark bandages of oblivion and lies cast over their eyes.

“Afterimages” – Ricardo Pons – 2006