Stashing and Scavenging. Aesthetics of residuality in Carlos Busqued's Bajo este sol tremendo

Abstract

In Bajo este sol tremendo (2009) there are two series or two lines that regulate the novel’s figures and motifs: on the one hand, the animal journey that narrates how the kraken is transformed into an Argentine cow; on the other, the process of transformation of things, from merchandise and the object of use or collection to ruin, waste, and remainder. The novel gathers, accumulates and exhibits them (key verbs for the discussion on contemporary art) to enable a coexistence of different materials and, therefore, of different regimes of meaning and visibility. Busqued gathers and piles up elements in a veritable discursive garbage dump and uses the novel and the book as a device to exhibit them. This essay approaches this book from the idea of installation and underlines the effects of the residual on the notion of temporality explored by the story.