In her first solo presentation within the US, the Brazilian artist Sallisa Rosa has created an immersive set up created from ceramics concocted from uncooked supplies gathered in Rio de Janeiro, the place she relies. The Audemars Piguet Modern fee, Topography of Reminiscence (2023), evokes a miniature cave, enveloping the viewer in a meditative area. Whereas the work symbolically references ancestry and identification, its themes usually are not particularly autobiographical. It goals to supply a extra common perspective on the concepts, permitting the materiality and physicality of Rosa’s course of to return to the forefront.
A check run of Rosa’s Miami set up, that includes stacked and suspended ceramics, at her studio Courtesy the artist and Audemars Piguet
The multidisciplinary artist was born in Goiás in 1986 and has levels in journalism and audiovisual creation and manufacturing. This 12 months, she has participated within the XXIII Bienal de Arte Paiz in Guatemala, and is at current included within the exhibition Ana Mendieta: Silhueta em Fogo, Terra Abrecaminhos on the SESC Pompéia in São Paulo. Final 12 months, Rosa was included in a number of main worldwide group exhibitions, together with the Summer season Exhibition on the Royal Academy of Arts, in London. After its run throughout Miami Artwork Week, Topography of Reminiscence will go on view subsequent spring on the Pina Contemporânea in São Paulo (16 March-27 July 2024).
The Artwork Newspaper: You developed a singular materials to create this set up, utilizing earth sourced from rural Rio de Janeiro. Might you clarify your course of?
Sallisa Rosa: That is the primary time I’m creating an set up totally with ceramics, and it’s an enormous work, with round 100 items. For me, it’s vital to know the place the earth comes from as a result of there’s reminiscence within the earth; this materials is embedded with info. I solely work with domestically sourced clay. I collaborated with artisans who’ve a really conventional means of working. It’s difficult work; the earth is combined with rocks, branches and generally trash, so it’s onerous to organize the clay for the firing course of. It’s so fragile and risky, nevertheless it’s a completely reside materials, and at all times produces distinct colors when combined. I work with the knowledge within the soil and reprogramme it, programming my very own reminiscences into the piece.
After Miami Seaside, the set up might be proven in São Paulo subsequent 12 months as a part of the inaugural programming of the Pina Contemporânea. How do you’re feeling these separate websites will have an effect on viewers’ expertise?
There’s a public facet to each exhibitions as a result of the work is immersive, with stalagmite-like constructions rising into the flooring and areas all through the piece that act like isolation cubicles. As soon as you permit the paintings, you’re again onto the road, or the group. These are each loud, city areas, however throughout the work the viewers can bear in mind what the earth appears like. Though the fabric is collected from Brazilian soil, the work will not be particular to that place. After all, there’s worth in presenting it in a context that’s nearer to residence, nevertheless it was essential for the work to journey so it may problem a wider vary of views.
Rosa tends to the fireplace that may warmth the kiln during which she fired the ceramics in Itaboraí, close to Rio Courtesy the artist and Audemars Piguet
Your work typically references Indigenous ancestry and what it means to be an Indigenous particular person in Brazil, generally by way of extra summary manifestations like sculptural installations. How do these concepts play into your apply?
My work will not be about particular communities, or a selected native perspective. I’m speaking about collective reminiscence—the reminiscence of the earth and the water. Though it’s attainable to see identification in my work, my very own identification is transitory. There’s a motion of artists who’re addressing identification by way of a extra world perspective. After all, we’re speaking about territory and land and belonging and identification, however there are a lot of other ways of approaching it that don’t essentially must put your work in any particular field.
You joined A Gentil Carioca over the summer season and can have a solo exhibition with the gallery in São Paulo subsequent 12 months. In the meantime, your works are on view at their stand at Artwork Basel in Miami Seaside. What are you exhibiting on the honest?
In Miami, there are some latest sculptures and drawings from a collection referred to as The Poison (2023)—the results of analysis on therapeutic and detoxing, and the method of abrasion that I made in preparation for The Topography of Reminiscence. It’s in regards to the means of cleaning and rejuvenation, and an extension of a collection I offered in my solo exhibition Supernova on the Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro in 2021-22. In São Paulo subsequent 12 months, there might be drawings and sculptures that incorporate thorns that I collected and numerous different supplies.
You lately started a two-year residency on the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. What have you ever been engaged on?
I’ve been enthusiastic about adaptability and researching how animals adapt to sure environments. As a toddler, after I lived in Mato Grosso, which is near Pará and the Amazon rainforest, we had rats in our residence. One evening, I heard a noise, wakened and turned on the sunshine. I noticed a hybrid animal—a half rat, half bat. I referred to as it a rato-cego (rat-bat). I requested folks across the neighbourhood about this animal, and folks instructed me it did exist. The rat had tailored to develop wings and fly away. I’ve been reflecting on this reference to adaptation and the way I’m additionally altering features of myself to adapt to a brand new actuality on one other continent.
• Sallisa Rosa: Topography of Reminiscence, till 17 December, Collins Park Rotunda, Miami Seaside
