WHAT WATER WILL
Image: Jota Mombaça, in the tired watering, 2022. Documentation of performance at the future site of the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo on the island of San Giacomo. Photo by Irene Fanizza. Courtesy the artist.
Although no amount of words can articulate that properly,
water will, in its undoing,
Hide some words and codes and sounds in its inconstancy.
Water will always contain,
the undone qualities
of the sunken,
their diluted memory. Water will.
Jota Mombaça
Last year, Brazilian nonbinary, interdisciplinary artist Jota Mombaça presented a cycle of work concerned with the elements, and ways of sensing attuned to the expressions of water, wind, fire, and earth.
Now, in their first U.S. solo exhibition, the artist is bringing a new, large-scale sculptural installation to their residency at KADIST, San Francisco.
Witnessing both the trauma of the transatlantic slave trade, and the rapidly increasing impact of climate change, Mombaça asks what we might learn by listening to the water: "What if water was telling us something about the way the planet is flooding?"
Image: Jota Mombaça. Documentation of installation components and sinking site in Amsterdam. Photo by Pedro Lima. Courtesy the artist.
In addressing this question, the artist traverses issues of displacement, environmental racism, extractivism, queer mourning, and time travel. As with the previous 'movements' of 'watery works', begun earlier this year, this exploration is also guided by a poem, penned by Mombaça.
Thus far, the sequence of works includes: in the tired watering (2022), a performance at the future site of the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo on the island of San Giacomo in Venice, curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist; what is coming for you is only dawn (2022), a performance sponsored by the
International Artists Studio Program in Stockholm; too much consciousness to be held by such a vulnerable entity (2022); and sinking could be (2022), an installation and a performance that was part of Super Feelings at de Appel Amsterdam.
Image: Jota Mombaça, too much conscious to be held by such a vulnerable entity, 2022. Photo by Sander van Wettum. Courtesy the artist.
This exhibition, THE SINKING SHIP/PROSPERITY, will feature Ghost 0, constructed from 160 feet of cotton that was submerged in the Venetian Lagoon for a number of months, then dredged up and unfurled as part of a performance at Isola di San Giacomo. Ghost 0 was then dried in the sun, revealing the sediment of waters in its creases and folds.
The work will soon flow through the gallery space at KADIST, supported by steel armature alongside four water-cut, aluminium sculptures—previously submerged in a canal —resembling dimensional drawings, and an accumulation of newly commissioned fabric sculptures of bleached and dyed cobalt and black linen,
currently sinking in three locations around the San Francisco Bay. The three locations triangulate along the coastline and out across the Pacific Ocean, connecting the sites of Mombaça’s recent performances.
Image: Jota Mombaça, in the tired watering, 2022. Documentation of performance at the future site of the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo on the island of San Giacomo. Photo by Irene Fanizza. Courtesy the artist.
Making the fabric sculptures is labour-intensive, involving twisting, wrapping, hauling, resurfacing, and draping. The process itself reflects and explores water’s restless, elemental properties. The KADIST residency piece, Ghost 0 (2022), will be installed in stages as the exhibition evolves.
The 'supernatural' sculptures will be accompanied by a two-channel sound installation and a video projection intended to create a sense of submersion, which the artist describes as a “wordless spectral realm,” and a “place of letting go.”
Image: Jota Mombaça. Documentation of installation components and sinking site in Amsterdam. Photo by Pedro Lima. Courtesy the artist.
The work will be on view from 27 October, 2022 to 28 January, 2023 during which there will be a performance accompanying the debut of a video, waterwill (2022), and also a conversation with art critic and philosopher, Darla Migan.
Additional information will be listed on the KADIST website.