Breathing with the salt marsh, 2024
Sol Koffler Gallery, May 2024, Providence, Rhode Island.
Multimedia installation with two videos (Breathing in [color, sound; 04:30 min]; Breathing out [color, sound; 05:30 min]); Landing Gesture sculpture: Textiles dipped in marsh peat, water, and New England clay [Handmade cotton gauze from Chaco, Argentina; Industrial cotton gauze from United States]; Shared Breath [Four blown glass pieces]; Material map [Eight birch plywood boards with soil mixture containing varying proportions of sand, soil, water from the salt marsh]
"Breathing with the Salt Marsh" is an installation designed to immerse visitors in the complexity of entanglement—connecting their bodies with the territory and material. This opportunity aims to displace what has been learned from this interaction and activate it within the context of an art gallery. The space is designed to make the visitor's body as crucial as any of the pieces comprising it. Visitors activate, sense, cast shadows, and breathe into the installation.
My goal was for visitors to authentically experience merging with the site, embodying the essence of the salt marsh in a direct and intertwined relationship with its material. The installation embodies a continuous interplay between these elements.
+
This exhibition represents the culmination of two years studying the salt marsh in Rhode Island.
[Four blown glass pieces]
A glass bubble serves as an abstract and conceptual representation of breathing onto or into a material, similar to how my body interacts with water or how the marsh responds to the tides.
"Shared Breath," involved two distinct experiments. Firstly, I used devices to visually depict the breathing process, capturing the rhythm and essence of inhalation and exhalation. Secondly, I experimented with various breathing techniques, observing how the material reacted to the air introduced into it.
In one part of the experiment, I created two glass bubbles and placed them in contact with each other. One bubble was inhaled into while the other was exhaled from, symbolizing the respiratory cycle as a shared action between two bodies. This exchange of air illustrated how the walls of both bubbles were affected, revealing the delicate interplay between the two forms.
Textiles dipped in marsh peat, water, and New England clay [Handmade cotton gauze from Chaco, Argentina; Industrial cotton gauze from United States]
"Landing Gesture" is a piece that explores the sense of belonging as a migrant in the United States, and the effort to connect with a land that is not my own. The work is crafted from fabric scraps brought from Chaco, Argentina—materials my mother uses in her artistic practice—alongside industrial fabrics from the United States.
The piece reflects on the landscape embedded within our bodies and how it can transform, attempting to capture layers of meaning in a new land. Through this blend of familiar and foreign materials, "Landing Gesture" delves into the complex process of finding a sense of place
This embodied exploration seeks firsthand understanding of how my body reacts to and resonates with the ever-changing forces of the environment. The project employs a dual perspective, capturing sweeping aerial views through a
Eight birch plywood boards with soil mixture containing varying proportions of sand, soil, water from the salt marsh]
Explores the intricate dynamics and ecological conditions of a salt marsh. Using wood and various soil mixtures—clay, sand, and water sourced from the marsh—I focused on controlling crack patterns within the material structure. This exploration aims to reflect the marsh's depth and its ability to manage tidal water drainage.
Through experimentation, I found that water content and layer thickness significantly affect crack formation: higher water content and thicker layers result in more cracks, while increased sand content and thinner layers produce fewer cracks. This correlation highlights areas with extensive cracking as indicative of zones with reduced drainage in the salt marsh environment.
Strategically incorporating pure wood established an interface zone, facilitating interaction between the wood and soil mixture. This interaction serves as a critical juncture where both elements actively contribute to the overall material composition and behavior of the map, illustrating the nuanced relationship between natural materials and environmental dynamics in the salt marsh ecosystem.