This is a series of three ceramic sculptures in different dimensions that are suspended in the air. The figures refer to the people who were never found after the disaster in Brumadinho that took place in January 2019, in the state of Minas Gerais/Brazil. They are hanging shapes shown in random falling positions — they are subjected to the force of nature and the human errors that took them away. They are subjected to the force of mud, of water, of the vegetation that has also been misplaced. The colors in rusty brown evoke the earth and the sludge, whereas the red scarfs they wear highlight the tragedy in it. The scarfs are loose, they run down the figures, much like the life that left their bodies. This is about reaffirming our inability to learn from the past in order to live the present placidly and to prepare a hopeful future. Knowing we do not learn is unacceptable. These works are meant to imprint in the eyes of the observer the tragic image of those bodies drowned in the mud — may this image never fade.  

 

Sandra Makowiecky

Professor of Art History and Criticism – UDESC