En el principio / In the beginning: Juliana G贸ngora Rojas, Mat铆as Quintero Sep煤lveda, Juven Piranga Valencia, and Yinela Piranga Valencia
Juliana G贸ngora Rojas is a Colombian sculptor who engages with organic materials, such as soil, salt, stones, or spider threads.
Interested in establishing networks of community and spiritual exchange, G贸ngora collaborates with artisans, farmers, and Indigenous communities in works that emphasize the importance of ordinary materials and daily actions, as well as the ties that intimately bind human beings with nature.
For her first exhibition at a major institution in the United States, G贸ngora has invited fellow artist Mat铆as Quintero Sep煤lveda and Juven and Yinela Piranga Valencia, leaders of the Ko鈥檙evaju Indigenous community of the Northern Colombian Amazon, to create an installation that honors the ongoing dialogue and spiritual collaboration that they have collectively sustained over several years. Weaving together earth, its pigments, milk, plant fibers, and seeds, the artists and community leaders give form to their shared vision of interconnectedness, collectivity, and creation.
At the heart of the exhibition are two works that together represent a complete universe, heavens and earth, womb and seed: the textile Manto celeste (Celestial Cloth), whose sand-based blue pigmentation represents motherhood, water, and the cosmic sky, and the burnished soil installation Piso de tierra (Earth Floor).
Other objects in the exhibition are made with sacred materials native to the Colombian territory that is home to the Ko鈥檙evaju community and displayed in ways that honor their traditional uses. Accompanying the installation is a text written by all four makers鈥斺�漚 word of encouragement鈥� for visitors鈥攖hat appears in Ko鈥檙evaju and Spanish with English translation and stresses the human task of preserving and caring for our common mother, Mother Earth.
Together, the works in the exhibition make up a 鈥渃osmic weaving,鈥� which reflects the collaborators鈥� experiences of the innate ties between humanity and our shared environment. They extend an invitation to recognize ourselves as guardians and stewards of everything that surrounds us, through collectivity and ritual in the shared space of the museum.
Juliana G贸ngora Rojas is a Colombian sculptor who engages with organic materials, such as soil, salt, stones, or spider threads.
Interested in establishing networks of community and spiritual exchange, G贸ngora collaborates with artisans, farmers, and Indigenous communities in works that emphasize the importance of ordinary materials and daily actions, as well as the ties that intimately bind human beings with nature.
For her first exhibition at a major institution in the United States, G贸ngora has invited fellow artist Mat铆as Quintero Sep煤lveda and Juven and Yinela Piranga Valencia, leaders of the Ko鈥檙evaju Indigenous community of the Northern Colombian Amazon, to create an installation that honors the ongoing dialogue and spiritual collaboration that they have collectively sustained over several years. Weaving together earth, its pigments, milk, plant fibers, and seeds, the artists and community leaders give form to their shared vision of interconnectedness, collectivity, and creation.
At the heart of the exhibition are two works that together represent a complete universe, heavens and earth, womb and seed: the textile Manto celeste (Celestial Cloth), whose sand-based blue pigmentation represents motherhood, water, and the cosmic sky, and the burnished soil installation Piso de tierra (Earth Floor).
Other objects in the exhibition are made with sacred materials native to the Colombian territory that is home to the Ko鈥檙evaju community and displayed in ways that honor their traditional uses. Accompanying the installation is a text written by all four makers鈥斺�漚 word of encouragement鈥� for visitors鈥攖hat appears in Ko鈥檙evaju and Spanish with English translation and stresses the human task of preserving and caring for our common mother, Mother Earth.
Together, the works in the exhibition make up a 鈥渃osmic weaving,鈥� which reflects the collaborators鈥� experiences of the innate ties between humanity and our shared environment. They extend an invitation to recognize ourselves as guardians and stewards of everything that surrounds us, through collectivity and ritual in the shared space of the museum.
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The Art Institute of Chicago announced En el principio / In the beginning: Juliana G贸ngora Rojas, Mat铆as Quintero Sep煤lveda, Juven Piranga Valencia, and Yinela Piranga Valencia, which will be on view March 29鈥揓uly 28, 2025.
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