¿nos miramos?
an intervention by Thomas N Pauli


¿nos miramos?
Do we see ourselves? - We see ourselves? - How do we see ourselves?

We all have a certain picture of ourselves, of our personality, of our effect on others and - we all have an ideal picture of ourselves, how we would like to be and what effect we would like to have on others. We all try very hard to approach this ideal as closely as possible and to demonstrate it not only to ourselves but also to our environment.

How do we express our own self? By words, opinions, gestures, actions by which we try to represent our personality, by our individual hairstyle and way of dressing, by objects we possess, all visible tokens of our innermost self.

The peluquería / hairdresser is a place where we consciously give ourselves the time to come to terms with ourselves, our appearance and our effect on others; here we try to find the external form corresponding to our inner self, a form which also gives us a feeling of satisfaction. On the other side it is also very important that others find us attractive and get a positive impression of who we are.

We are not only seen by others, we ourselves see those around us. Why not for once to see ourselves from different points of view, for example as yo, tú, él, ella, usted, nosotros, vosotros, ellos, ellas, ustedes. And we could ask ourselves how it feels to be yo, tú, él, ella, usted, nosotros, vosotros, ellos, ellas, ustedes.

We are forever part of a community, whether we like it or not. Our individual personality can only be lived in a community being mirrored by it. Let us use the time of self-reflection in front of the hairdresser’s mirror to imagine ourselves in alternating positions in this community so that we have a look from these positions to ourselves from a certain distance – a chance to get a feeling for our real "playground" beside our normally experienced "I am":

I am wife /husband and simultaneously always daughter/son, friend, neighbor, colleague, perhaps sister/brother, mother/father, boss ... but in any case part of a community.
We should become aware of the many positions we have as part of a community. Do we always act according to this awareness?

Are we aware of belonging to the cultural community of a region, a language or civilization and moreover part of the great global community we all belong to?


¿nos miramos? - Do we see ourselves?
First realisation December 2002 in Trujillo / Peru



(yo/i, tú/you, él/he, ella/she, usted/you, nosotros/we, vosotros/they, ellos/you-m, ellas/you-f, ustedes/you)