Between the unbridled sex of a porn and the idealized love of a rose novel, the new lesbian-fantasy book by Dalia Rosetti, alter ego of the poet and visual artist Fernanda Laguna, displays a scathing sense of humor to radiograph the vices of the world of art, with the excuse of an international curatorial congress in Patagonia, where “El fuego entre nosotras” is set.
A fundamental agitator of the Latin American scene for two decades, Laguna -poet, narrator, artist, curator, creator of the Eloísa Cartonera publishing house and the Beauty and Happiness gallery- knows perfectly the universe on which she unfolds her new novel, published by Random House.
“Not a single panties have dried on me and it is not because it has not stopped raining for weeks but because of the excitement that has visited me these days,” reads the beginning of the novel in the words of Valeria, a domestic worker in love with her “patron”, María, who will attend an art congress, where all kinds of hilarious and unlikely situations will occur.
It will be at the meeting in Bariloche where the characters of Valeria and María will meet Dalia Rosetti -alter ego of Laguna and pseudonym with which she has signed several of her books-, where the author will sketch a fantastic sequence of events as a result of a misunderstanding : a message of love that turns into an unexpected and unplanned “tremendous conceptual artwork.”
Those attending the meeting will interpret it as “the revolutionary work of an anonymous genius”, it will be a trending topic on the networks and even the Argentine security services will send the Prefecture and the Army to investigate “, in a narration that will include the preparation of a performance, lesbian porn scenes and a hilarious sense of humor.
“Dalia Rosetti beats a lot of fruit and crosses boundaries between right and wrong. The matter of her body is built with each letter that says something. Dalia from time to time needs to do her thing, so I help her to have her presence. physical so that he can do it “, says Laguna in an interview with Télam about his alter ego with which he signs” The fire between us “.
– Télam: What was the genesis, the trigger for the novel?
– Fernanda Laguna: As always the trigger is to start writing; the desire to lose myself in an adventure that I do not know where it will go. The mistery. The trigger is to launch myself forward and downward in Word. Dalia Rosetti lives in that world. The matter of your body is built up with each letter that says something.
– T: What licenses does Dalia Rosetti allow you to take as your alter ego, that you cannot carry out with Fernanda Laguna?
– FL: A lot. Dalia beats a lot of fruit and crosses boundaries between right and wrong. She says what she thinks and sometimes what she says or does is not very politically correct. There is a patriarchal idea that women should be holy and is not allowed anything other than to achieve perfection. Be quiet and located. Dalia is a girl who shows herself openly and is judged by everyone. In his world there are women who are rapists, murderers, trout, who fart, ambitious, who spit on the floor and are very competitive.
– T: What has of you, and what not, this alter ego?
-FL: Dalia came up when I went to a bar and started writing because the food was taking too long. They had given me a free dinner voucher. And at one point I was paranoid that the card was expired. And I didn’t have a weight. To distract myself I began to write “Tattooed forever”, a little story where we ended up in a hot jail with Dalia for not having paid for the restaurant. She came to rescue me, dynamited the prison of my self-perception as an individual being. We are never one. It even paved the way for me to what I now believe it to be. that there is no individual, but rather that we are multi-beings with the beings that we make contact with. There are many things about Fernanda that are incompatible with Dalia: the world of the art market, my shows, having a resume and being approved for virtues, motherhood. So I realized that we were not one. Then it happened that a part of me needed its independence. It was like a fruit that, increasingly heavy, fell from the tree. And that’s where Dalia was born. Now I dropped another fruit and branched out into Blixmi Velo Aurín (little blood), a more elf and artisan me.
-T: The tension in the novel occurs when a supposed work of art appears that fascinates and scandalizes everyone equally, after a puppy passes by and defecates it. What aspects of the world of art that you know so well served you to set the novel?
– FL: The most extravagant thing that the art world handles is the quantum level of relativity. Everything can be two or more things at the same time. Something can be both great and crap. Worth millions or nothing. The best are the worst, and the worst are cult. So it was a wonderful belly to go to that art conference. A lot of lift, a lot of snobbery, a lot of champagne! I was very excited to put myself in the body of people who believe in the world of art. It gives me so much pleasure that I would keep writing about it forever.
-T: The novel plays with the idea that there is a work of art “so subtle or conceptual” that one does not realize it. How do you perceive contemporary conceptual art?
-FL: I don’t think things have only one meaning or reading. And I do not think that it is necessary to reflect on everything and draw reassuring conclusions that leave us standing in a place of safety. Everything has its mistake, everything. And it should not be condemned to a sense of learning. It is good that things not only serve to reflect. I write for the entertainment of the smile and to warm up the engines.
– T: The protagonist says that “it is difficult for her to detach reality from fiction” because she suspects that they are the same. In what way does that phrase resonate in your daily life?
– FL: The experience of living with Dalia makes me believe that reality is a type of fiction and vice versa. Reality is a composition, a story. That is known, but the most beautiful thing is that fiction is real. Dalia exists, it is a fiction that it writes itself. Fiction is a different gradation of reality, put it at 60 percent. It makes you laugh, cry, excite, travel, die, revive. Everything we think exists we make it real. And it seems to me that we must defend our self-perception of reality, defend our own gaze.
– T .: The novel displays equal doses of fantasy and erotic story. How did you come to combine both aspects?
– FL: I love the body. Isn’t it like a stranger we live with? He is half our clumsy companion who deals with the less pretentious and eschatological subjects of life. In that sense I love to relate scenes of fucking, which I see as another branch of eschatology (which gives a lot of pleasure) and above all that releases energy pumps that cancel reason and do not produce anything. And that’s a lot in a world where everything has to be for something! I also really like mindless action movies, the choreographic thing of chases, explosions, when they spin on the floor or jump out of a window. So Dalia and I tried to put a lot of jewelry into the novel. Much smell of burnt gunpowder. (Télam)
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