SOLO SHOW AT GALERIA LUME, SÃO PAULO, 2024
MYTHS, TALES & ALLEGORIES
MYTHS, TALES & ALLEGORIES UNTIED ON A CURTAIN | IGI LOLA AYEDUN
Imagine... the sky.
Neck tilted, cervical tense, thoracic stiffened, lumbar vibrating, sacrum stretched, coccyx numb.
Temporal spilled, greater wing beating, frontal warming to rest on the orbital blade and in the lacrimal bone, pour the pleasure of evoking an image.
Jaw stretched, mental foramen and maxilla widened upon realizing, among so many daydreams, the very sky within oneself. This same profound, inflamed, and reflective sky in the smoke of an intoxicated breath less than ninety degrees toward the upper pulpit of ideas about the world.
The power to fabricate truths from what is seen.
Imagine, then, the devotion that rises in the breaking of the semitendinosus in a fall, in the determination of the patella, and in the impact of the tibialis anterior muscle on the ground! The expansion of the visible as a system of faith.
Imagine, too, in the symphony of a single note conducted by many voices, the proximal radioulnar articulation burning and raising the radius and ulna in the surrender of the carpus, metacarpus, and phalanges of palms turned to the stars.
The materialization of the image as a system of order.
Everything absolute establishes itself in what is called its place, the gear of iconography prevails high, gesticulating the propaganda of beauty, love, and war. Images lie.
iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii, how much stupor!
Still, disobey. Disorganize, disconfigure, disjoint, and disconnect every inch of the common sense of formalizing things, indoctrinated by miserable functions of vile mechanisms of power that challenge the freedom of natural existence.
Disfigure.
Disfigure the image. Disfigure the image of the image, the image of the image, and the image and also disfigure the image of the image of the image until the figure is no longer an image and with it goes the representation, the personification, the resemblance, the symbol, the imitation, the copy, the portrait, the scene, the icon, the model, the similarity, the reflection, and the replica so that we are finally completely taken by the sensitive.
Tell her that even the angels caught us dancing.
FIRE HORSE |
OIL ON WOOD
Based on extensive iconographic research that encompasses various types of votive images such as angels, saints, mythological gods, ideas of alien beings, ritualistic dances, and even representations of religious gestures, Gabriella, through artificial intelligence, presents mixed allusions to entities that, through commands, merge, transform, and sometimes cancel each other out, surpassing limits that result in abstract forms while retaining only the essence of their memories.
The fanciful name "Fire Horse" refers to the final images of the entire process, which, after being digitally modified, come to life in the artist's hands in the physical realm as two-dimensional works that exist in the space between painting and sculpture, ultimately resembling various forms that relate to numerous fields of image representation, even after being nullified, decharacterized, and abstracted from their original contexts.
CONSCIOUS REVERIES | ONE TONE ROOM
AUTO BLESSING | CONCRETE, BRONZE AND OIL PAINT
A columnar, mythological being bends. While its bronze, human hands are extended in a gesture that is quite familiar through its somewhat religious connotation, the being seems to offer you something while also asking for something in return. This entity embodies different eras, referring to the past and present in a futuristic manner. It creates, bends, asks, gives, illuminates, and points.
While its "face," suspended by its curved neck, resembles a technological screen, an oil painting illuminates and completes its realization as a representation of the independence of self-blessing.
This independent proposal refers to Gabriella's research, who, for years, has entered churches and encountered various holy water fonts where Christians can bless themselves—whether they are analog, and more recently, automatic and digital.
WINDOW TO SOME PARADISE | CONCRETE, BRONZE AND OIL PAINT
“Some Paradise” explores religious gestural codes traditionally used to bless, pray, or seek forgiveness. Here, Gabriella revisits part of this Greco-Roman iconography and recreates it through artificial intelligence.
Outstretched hands, right hand raised, fingers pointing—all these gestures not only question the limits of devotion but also the very boundary of the image as an icon. Now inserted into the illusory realm of artificial intelligence, the works move away from sanctified humanization and introduce new fundamental elements: the deformity of the image and its still-gestural memory. When removed from context, these images verge on the abstract, expanding perceptions and generating new interpretations.
These gestural images are then positioned against backgrounds with repetitive representations of skies as a kind of sacred place of merit, evoking a sense of belonging through this divine and powerful space, which can also be punitive and manipulative.
DISCOVERY | CONCRETE, IRON, OIL PAINT AND SCRATCH CARD
In the work "Discovery," the sculptural composition made of concrete mass is formed through fragments abstracted from the 1839 work "Pano de Boca" by Debret, commissioned by José Bonifácio. The original piece depicted the coronation of Dom Pedro I at the beginning of what we call the Brazilian Empire, portraying the political image in an apotheotic manner, with the goal of garnering public support to legitimize the monarchy through an ideal of society, aligned with the standards of a modern nation. This work highlights the fragility of its visual truths, thereby intensifying the degree of image construction.
Gabriella, therefore, proposes a new massive and deformed image with a suggestion of non-existent, two-dimensional iconographic hierarchy. The artist represents the winged beings as if they were part of a single body, merging with the mass that refers to both the imperial crown and the angels that suspend it, presenting a new form that, when extracted from its original context, borders on the abstract.
It is at this moment that the image, as a "defigurative" object, completes its realization and becomes dependent on interpretations rather than intentions, allowing this new proposal of the old image to be reconsidered.
The crucial point that led Gabriella to intervene in this image and its allegorical discourse was José Bonifácio's request for Debret to replace the palm trees supporting the canopy over the throne with classical ornaments. The intention was to create a Europeanized environment through civilization, ensuring that no notion of savagery would be present, which would distance the image from that of a Constitutional Empire—yet another example of delusional manipulation in favor of power movements through imagery.
Finally, alongside the sculpture, the work is completed by a second piece that situates the artist's discourse within a new proposal for the idea of the image: a scratch card featuring Debret's painting in the background, with a scratchable area in the shape of the concrete sculpture referenced earlier. When the surface is scratched away, what emerges is an image of the vast Brazilian forest. What was once relegated to the background as a form of deceit now reclaims its space as the protagonist of this image.
DESNATUREZA | CONCRETE, IRON AND OIL PAINT
In "Desnatureza," Gabriella selects two botanical scientific illustrations painted in watercolor.
The first is by Joaquim José Codina and was depicted in the Amazon in the mid-1700s. Gabriella then presents the sculptural reproduction of "Amaryllis," the result of a hybrid between two species: one South African and the other native to Brazil, which were crossed by Dutch hands during a scientific expedition aimed at expansion and scientific development. The species still exists today.
The second sculpture represents a species of orchid depicted in a lithograph by Charles Motte, also in the mid-1700s. It is an original Brazilian species, reproduced by Motte as a "discovery" of the colonial period. Despite extensive research conducted by Gabriella, the exact specificity or evolution of this species remains unresolved, even though there are numerous illustrations of it from the 1700s to the 1800s. This is likely a species that no longer exists today, an extinct species.
These iconographic choices highlight two colonial consequences: the implicit miscegenation within this vast colonial exploratory laboratory and the extinction of peoples and species.
GABRIELLIC ANGEL | CONCRETE, IRON AND OIL PAINT
“In appearance, they had the form of a man, but each of them had four faces and four wings. Their legs were straight; their feet were like those of a calf and shone like polished bronze. Under their wings, on all four sides, they had human hands. All four had faces and wings, and their wings touched one another.”
Starting from the premise that the biblical description of an angel is completely different from the iconographic representation we are accustomed to seeing of a blond and white being, the pair of sculptures “Gabrielle Angels” are the result of commands executed by Gabriella through artificial intelligence, incorporating a multiplicity of stylistic currents.
The “Gabrielle Angels” are formed from mythological references, aesthetic procedures of filling, futuristic ideas with extraterrestrial representations, arabesques, and gargoyles.
FAITH MEMORY
I SWORE LIES | CONCRETE, IRON AND OIL PAINT
A deep laser engraving on a marble stone features a reproduction of Victor Meirelles' painting "First Mass," which was funded by the Pedro II empire. The painting presents a false representation of the introduction of indigenous peoples to Catholicism, commonly referred to as catechization.
It portrays the colonizers as having been received in a submissive and consensual manner by the indigenous peoples. The choice of this specific image to illustrate the work is significant because it perpetuates a false documentation that has led to grotesque consequences due to invasion, disfigurement, theft, and all the atrocities and machinations committed in favor of European power and the political-religious institution.
With this in mind, the ingrained engraving on the marble carries this image. However, alongside it is a tool (a mini rotary tool) available to the public, offering the opportunity not only to erase but also to add elements to the scene as desired by the audience.
VIDEOS
