The creating eye and the viewing eye: they meet in the artwork. For the creator, it is necessary to distance themselves from imagination, that contrary eye which chooses, among its gestures, the one to attribute meaning. For the viewer, proximity and involvement inform and broaden the understanding of what is in motion. This motion is part of the image, preceding it and continuing after it.

In this series of paintings and etchings, Cris Rocha presents the unfolding of a realized life. And therein lies the charm and courage of her choice. Determined to understand and grasp the structure of the forms she sees and imagines—that which is not revealed to the unprepared eye—she goes beyond the formal construction of the image to live, in her silent way, a transformative experience. It is by perceiving the order of the external world that she transcends it. Touches her self. Purges her imagination of the devices that would veil her memory.

Cris states that the images are created referencing doors, arches, passages. Physical structures. I dare say that she is building the house of herself. The house where, as Bachelard states, we are far from any reference to simple geometric shapes. The lived house is not an inert box. The inhabited space transcends the geometric space. Cris looks inside to the steps she has been imagining along the way. And imagines them with the pleasure experienced by those who find out that it is possible to seek the meaning of things when they indeed have meaning.

Regina Ohlweiler – 2000