As I continue developing the Critical Publication, I’ve been thinking less about the “what” and more about the “how.” What kind of voice does this publication need? What should it feel like to read it? And who, exactly, am I speaking to?
The visual mockups I shared in my last post were a way to test ideas without committing to a format. But as those experiments grew, they began to suggest something else—an emerging tone. Somewhere between archival and speculative, academic and playful. Not quite a traditional catalog, not quite a monograph. The more I worked with these visual references—from 70s IKEA catalogs to Belén’s handwritten notes—the more I realized that formality doesn’t suit this project. Instead, what feels right is a tone that shifts: sometimes reflective, sometimes editorial, sometimes curious. A publication that doesn’t pretend to be definitive, but invites interpretation. One that lets the reader sit inside the process, not just observe its outcome.
I’ve started to think of the Critical Publication as something porous. Not just a document about Belén’s work, but something that reflects the open-ended, materially grounded nature of her practice. That means layering voices, fragments, images, and textures in a way that invites the reader to piece things together—to feel like they’re participating in the logic of the studio. So, this next phase is about tone-setting. Not just in the written content, but in how the text sits on the page, how it’s punctuated by images, how it feels to flip through.
What kind of pace does it have? Is there room for pause? For play?
I don’t have the answers yet—but asking these questions is helping shape the editorial framework of what the Critical Publication could become.
