High sensitivity hides superpowers. That is what attracted me at the work of Carla Cascales Alimbau. Carla Cascales Alimbau is an independent artist living and working in Barcelona.

Her work looks like a beautiful light in my eyes. Every piece of Carla's work, even if it is a sculpture or a painting, makes me feel the same intense feelings revealing to me the same power. The power that derives from the combination of truth, love, passion, high sensitivity, high perception, imagination, creativity. An art mixture at its best.

One more distinctive element at the aesthetic of Carla's art, is the one of imperfection. The way she handles every piece, so as to incorporate this imperfection and to transform it into the most powerful element of the body. Cause finally, those imperfections, if we handle them at the appropriate way, could be the ones that make us powerful and unique.

The mindful Carla Cascales Alimbau, answers my 6 questions, confirming me that when you respect your innate talent, the nature and your body, then life could be more inspiring for everyone.

Enjoy the recorded (raw material) or the written interview with an oral "format". 

(As always, i suggest you to listen to the recorded interview, since it works in a more vivid way).

Twelve winks: Your creations consist of different materials and forms of expression but all of your art pieces have a common ground. The one of the power of simplicity. What is the feeling-intuition that directs you to pick the medium of expression (i.e: sculpture, painting..)

Carla Cascales Alimbau:  What I do is take all the things that are ornamental and to leave the essence of the piece or the essence of the material. That's why even when I do Ceramics or sculpture or painting all the pieces have something in common. It's this kind of essence of the material of the piece that I want to keep in all the art that I do. For me natural is very important so I always use natural materials that fascinate me. I feel more than an artist. what I do is take the materials that are naturally beautiful and transform them in something new but the beauty of the material is already existing. So I'm just discovering this hidden beauty. I don't have like a way of choosing why a sculpture or why a painting. Is more a feeling. Sometimes I feel I need more volume to transmit an idea or a feeling and sometimes I feel that with the painting -i also use volume for my paintings - but I feel that with a painting is enough what I want to express so it's something that comes natural but what I always do is try with different materials. I don't want to get bored in one material so I try a lot of different materials. This is what I like.

Twelve winks: The majority of your art pieces are designed with some kind of premeditated flaw. Personally, i love those objects that have a "crack". Do you believe that authentic beauty comes along with flaws and cracks? What is the philosophy behind those art pieces.

Carla Cascales Alimbau: There's a beautiful sentence that says there's a crack in everything.
That's how the light gets in. This is a sentence from Leonard Kohen from one of his songs. I really love that, when you allow cracks is something that is hurting but it's also something that allows you to reveal yourself and to become a new person. The first time that I heard about this philosophy was in wabi sabi in this Japanese philosophy where they believe that all that happens to you and all that happens to an object is beautiful even a crack and instead of hiding that, they repair these cracks with gold to say something like I'm proud of my cracks because they made me what I am and instead of hiding them I'm showing them.
And I'm showing them as a mark of beauty. So I really like that and I really like the way they see beauty in Japan like they see getting old and degradation as something beautiful as something that is part of us never something like…I think in Europe…in our society we see getting old as something bad and I would like to think about it as something natural and something beautiful something we can't stop so it's better to accept something that we try to hide it. So this is something that I try to communicate in my pieces.

Twelve winks: Do you remember, when you were a little child, what role played at your everyday life, the sense of beauty around you? Could you remember if is somehow the same feeling that you have today with the difference that back then you couldn't decode it while today you can express this feeling through you own way?

Carla Cascales Alimbau: What I remember that I was always fascinated by art. My father loved art and he always showed me his kind of our books and brought me to exhibitions. So it's something that it was already my life when I was a little child and my mother is an interior design. So she always took care of the home of the spaces, of the light. It was very important for her that we, that everyone in the house felt good inside the space and I think that's something that I didn't realize when I was a child but now I feel that is really part of me. And when I make my pieces, I want.. that these pieces make other people feel this calm that I feel when I do them because it brings me a lot of joy and a lot of calm to make art. It’s also very challenging and there's also suffering, you know the pieces. But it brings me so much joy that I can’t stop doing. It is something that comes really natural to me. And I remember I always wanted to be an artist since I was a child, but when I arrived to University it was very difficult for me to decide to study art because I thought that in our society is very difficult to have a good life with creativity. So I decided to study design and to study advertising to do something more commercial, but at the end if you want to be happy, you need to follow your heart.

I was changing from my career in design to Arts very naturally because my body was asking for that. So at that point when I was changing my career more to arts I was feeling as this little child that she always wanted to be an artist. So I was feeling that I was connected with that feeling inside me.

Twelve winks: Natural light and the different aspects of it, affects the way we see things in everyday life. The same place, object, person, looks and feels differently according to the forms of light. Is there any connection between the natural light and your work?

Carla Cascales Alimbau: Yes. It's a strong connection. In my studio, I have a lot of natural light and now I'm moving to the new studio where there's more natural light for me. The most important thing in the new studio is to have as much as natural light I could have. I think that with natural light you really see the real texture of materials, of things. For me is fascinating and when I think in the pieces, I think how they look with natural light and all the pictures that I think of my pieces is with natural light.

For me is something that really affects us. The natural like keeps our cycle of energy during the day and I want that to be part of my pieces. So yeah, natural light is definitely something that I need to be able to work. I always paint with natural light. If not..for me in not the same. I can’t.

Twelve winks: Could you describe how it feels just right at the moment where you come up with the idea of a new art piece? What do you think that influences your inspiration?

Carla Cascales Alimbau: What I think it's one of the best feelings when you feel that you are discovering a new way. The last time that I had this feeling, it was…I was in a trip. For a long time I wanted to visit  Africa and I had the opportunity to visit the north of Ethiopia for two weeks. I was travelling around there and I took some of the stones that in Ethiopia they build the church directly in the stone. Is like they carve the stone and they build the church that is completely inside the Rocks. So I was completely fascinated by that.

And I took a few rocks. The special thing for these rocks is that they are very red. So I took  a few of these rocks from the floor and when I came back to the studio, I made these rocks into powder and I was making pigment with this rocks. So my new paintings are coming from these stones that I took from Africa. So, for me is really special to see this connection. What I felt looking at that buildings/architecture that could transform that into a painting. It was really special. It was you really special. I still didn't show these pieces but I will show them very soon and it makes me like having a reason to go to the studio every day and to live. I do have this feeling that you can communicate something you feel inside to the others.

Twelve winks: What raises your serotonin at your everyday life?

Carla Cascales Alimbau: I think it's very important to be happy every day, to really enjoy every of your days and I think that for that it's important to have like a routine that you like , a routine of self-care. For me it's very important I do pilates.  And every morning I do my exercises and my stretching and I feel my muscles strong. I'm in hands strong so I can work well with them. That makes me feel really good. Also I try to drink a lot of water. This is something that I'm making now and  I've been trying this for two weeks now and I really feel a lot better, drinking a lot of water feeling my body feeling clean.

Also eating well eating food that is natural, for me is really important what you put inside your body is the energy that you can have. So this energy it's to be really healthy and clean. So for me that’s importantly. It doesn't mean to be very strict with the food you eat, but to really feel good with the food you're eating. This is something that makes me feel really good.

And now. In these times that we are in lockdown, in Spain. I really feel the need to see my friends and I try- not every day because sometimes is not possible- to see my friends and family as much as possible to be in contact with them. This is something that really makes me feel good. And also walking a lot, going everywhere walking. Being close to nature.
And being close to the sea. We're very lucky in Barcelona, we have a beautiful sea. So it's something that when I need to calm I can always go there and watch the sea.
Also take time for myself not trying to rush. everywhere. So these little things that make life wonderful.

      * All images are from Carla's Cascales Alimbau image library.