Fac Simile was an exhibition that featured the first presentation of the Mimesis Project: a set of clothing and objects created by the designer Lara Torres in close collaboration with jeweler Catarina Dias and the ceramist Mário Nascimento. The exhibition FacSimile, was about the making process of the Mimesis Project as in ‘process art’ it emphasised the ‘process’ of making (rather than any predetermined composition or plan) and the concepts of change and transience.
The visitors to the exhibition, could see an account of the production process of the Mimesis Project, the experimentation, the failures, the months of frustration and accomplishment, moments of pure joy when accomplishing something. Like an archaeologist, I was trying to put together fragments to recover a shape long lost, in the resemblance of a puzzle of bits and pieces of ideas of ‘what fashion Is?’ By describing and recollecting the remnants as in an archaeological station, the results depend on far more than the mode of search and research than in the end itself. The audience would be witness to all the processes of production, being able to see the errors and failures, instead of being a consumer of a finished product. The audience becomes a witness of the studio work. The possibility of witnessing all the working process of the products presented adds a consciousness of the complexity of creation and production of something. During Mimesis, the importance of trace was very meaningful, deciphering the working methods like an archaeological station, depending more on the mode of search and research that in the end itself.
Download here the catalogue of the exhibition.