«Réceptacle» presents the works of the 4 winners of the 10th edition of the competition, the EthnoGraphic collective, Elvia Teotski, Bianca Bondi and the Dutca-Sidorenko collective. From the multiple toponymies of the Brazilian river, to the question of cycles and fragile materials or the invention of a tale in dark water, the works proposed are astonishing in their forms as in their subject.
InventaRios unfolds as a vast installation, it is the result of several stays in Brazil and the restitution of a long investigation at the crossroads between art and sociology. 56 earthen pots, traditional containers from the villages of Sertão, are coupled with notebooks and a drawing of the river and question the link to water in this region of Brazil, notably the toponymy of the river. Elvia Teotski presents a sculptural work, Spleen Microbien 2.0, in which 200 small petrified agar-agar columns evoke mould, the force of matter, the evaporation of water and the life that continues to play out in micro-organisms. Also interested in another material, salt in this case, Bianca Bondi transforms a small stool into a sacred well, where anyone can throw their offerings. Transformed into a treasure chest, a receptacle of many stories, with a baroque and refined look coated with salt crust, The Wishing Well II is the witness of our demands and a tribute to the art of fountains. As for the Dutca-Sidorenko collective, they photograph a legend about an amphibian being in a river and reveal a form of Moldavian folklore mixed with burlesque and fantasy.
Receptacle of stories, beliefs, materials, hidden lives and multiple names, the artists integrate water through the prism of the container as a metaphor or real object.
Visual : Bianca Bondi, The Whishing Well II, 2020.
Courtesy of the artist © Bianca Bondi
