Onda/Opáco 2017

 

Emerging as meditations on distance, longing, and the delicate tension between memory and presence, these works function as love letters—to Rio de Janeiro and to a distant lover—expressions of the spaces and rhythms that linger in the imagination. Upon entering the gallery, visitors encounter a five-meter-long translucent sheet of polythene, suspended and responsive to the air currents. It moves with a gentle, undulating rhythm, rustling softly in a soundscape that is both intimate and expansive. Sometimes it hovers calmly above the floor, at others it swells, breaking and sweeping the space, only to recede and rise again, as if breathing. In front of this oscillating wave lies a square water mirror. Within it, a clear vinyl sheet holds salt water atop a bed of coal lumps. At certain points, copper supports lift the vinyl, forming small archipelagos reminiscent of the islands gracing the horizon from Ipanema beach. Overhead, a diffuser softens the gallery’s artificial light, allowing the installation to exist in a quiet, contemplative atmosphere. Together, the two works enter a dialogue: the wave provides the sound and rhythm for the landscape, while the landscape reflects and amplifies the motion, forming a cyclical interplay of movement, memory, and space.

For the artist, these pieces arise from a personal geography split across continents. Growing up in Rio de Janeiro, he carries the textures, rhythms, and colors of the city within him; living across the ocean has rendered these memories both distant and acute. The installation creates a space for contemplation, inducing calm and stillness, where memory, desire, and perception converge. The works articulate the temporal and emotional space between presence and absence, tracing the pulse of a place and a connection felt from afar.