By Gabriele Dow

Writer Gabriele Dow (poetry) from the United States and artist Patricia Gómez Álvarez (images)  from Spain, also known as the collaborative duo The Pushers, discuss their recent series In Situ. View more of their work here.

In Situ is a conceptualization of the political, economic, and social situation we believe currently exists in Spain. The pictures use children’s toys to represent real-life situations in a sarcastic manner, highlighting the simplicity in “complex” issues. At the same time, the pictures along with the poems provide a focused critique of the country’s situation and what can come of it in the future.

Patricia Gómez Álvarez took the photographs, and I wrote the poems during my nine months living in Barcelona. The project was sparked by a discussion of the many scandals that have recently unfolded in Spanish politics, coupled with the suffering economic state of the country (which includes an increasing divide between the rich and poor), and the resulting social implications.

 The pictures were taken first. What is written does not necessarily describe each photograph, but the overall message in each pairing is meant to be the same. The concept of word vs. image is another that we’d like to present to the viewer. Ideally what is said or written and what is done or seen should go together, relate in some way, support each other. But from the mouths of politicians, this is often not so.

The Pushers is a collaborative duo that often deals with social issues, presented as a play between word and image.

See more of Dow and Alvarez's In Situ series here.