A Little Tale for Vain Fetishists and Porcelain Lovers
When I spent my weekends dancing in Colombian nightclubs and carnivals, it was mandatory, fashionable, and essential to wear 13cm stiletto heels. This is a story of youthful memories, memories somewhere between nostalgic and humorous, somewhere between cliché and city fable. All of this came to mind while reading my friend Angelamaria story, inspired by my porcelain fetish sculptures, commissioned in 2011.
At that time, South American teenagers didn’t care if their feet hurt dancing in these unthinkable heels. The important thing was to feel sensual, glide easily across the dance floor, and appear taller so they could dance with the tallest and most handsome guy around. To the rhythm of merengue, salsa, mambo, or lambada, I completely forgot the pain like needles stabbing my feet; the frenzy enveloped me completely. Today, my body moves with emotion when I hear this music, but those 13 cm heels don’t fit me.
THE SIRENS’ SHOES tale:
Well, yes, no one has ever wondered why the Sirens decided to grow a gorgeous fishtail? Because long ago, when they had legs, vanity led them to always seek the most beautiful, lightest, and most elegant heeled sandals. And when they found these precious porcelain, they fell so in love with them that they didn’t realize they weren’t made for just any foot. You had to be the Cinderella at the ball to be able to wear them, and even have enjoyed a special enchantment…
Anyway, the Sirens wanted to put them on and suffered greatly while putting them on. Their feet hurt so much that they asked their patient father Neptune to exchange their aching limbs for shiny and seductive fish tails. “Without feet there was no need for shoes and without shoes there was no pain in the feet,” was the conclusion.
When the Sirens finally felt their vanity quenched, they left these fragile and delicious heels on the beach, which from that moment on awaited a new princess who would wear them.
These sculptures were commissioned by a private collector and exhibited only once, in the spring of 2010, at the Museo della Marineria in Cesenatico, Italy. Made of porcelain and stoneware, with pigments and silkscreen printing. They were sized after the shape of my feet.
The Italian title: SCARPE D’AMARE is an ambiguous expression, heels of love / heels of the sea.
Angelamaria Golfarelli for the work “Scarpe D’A MARE” by Martha Pachón Rodríguez, text for the catalog of the exhibition: “Pesciolino d’Aprile” Cesenatico, Italy
Angelamaria Golfarelli lives and works in Forlì, Italy. Writer, poet and curator of artistic exhibitions. In her main literary work: “Fiocchi di neve e favalesche”, “…Fino al mare”, “Favorendo un’incauta solitudine” and “Le lacrime dell’Oceano”.
Among her cultural and journalistic projects, the most relevant are: Collaboration with the international magazine EE Earth Element, Director of the Brenta Sculpture Biennial, Italy. Creator and director of the cultural and literary events “Carissimo Pinocchio”, “Prestami il volto”, “Eppur si muove” and “Coefficient d’Art” among others.
