Ingrid Hora Cloud Catchers
curated by Emanuele Guidi
“Two thousand five hundred years ago, a man ordered the sea to be whipped.” Thus begins the story of Cloud Catchers, narrated by a female voice. The work unfolds as a tapestry of ancient myths recounting humanity’s precarious relationship with water — from violent floods to persistent droughts, often personified through female figures. Interwoven with these legends are fragments of conversations with scientists, researchers, and climate psychologists, translating into the present the complexity of finding words and narratives capable of giving voice to the water crisis and its inequalities.
Ingrid Hora’s research stems from an imaginary inspired by fog fences, a soft water-harvesting technology recently developed and currently being tested in different parts of the world — including Barcelona and the Anti-Atlas mountain range in Morocco.
The research has taken shape as a three-channel video installation, modeled on this technology and enriched by sculptural interventions that expand Hora’s exploration of forms and representations of vessels used to condense and contain water: Dragon Trees, ocarinas, and vessels of various physiognomies narrate the continuity and communication between bodies.
The moving images, filmed by the artist on the Mediterranean Sea, are edited according to a high-intensity choreography: they pursue a rhythm dictated by the incessant flow of videos found and collected on social media and scientific platforms. Originating from the ancestral efforts humanity has made to dominate water — across oceans, mountains, and skies — Cloud Catchers attempts to grasp a collective, anxious, and extreme present, tracing the contours of a narrative that can only be choral.
Cloud Catchers is promoted by BAR project in collaboration with Hangar (Barcelona) and Eurac Research (Bolzano), with the support of Fondazione Dar Bellarj (Marrakech).
Interviews: Elena Mains and Ingrid Hora
Director of photography and editing: Daniel Mazza
Screenplay: Tod Wodicka
Choreography: Sigal Zouk, Laurie Young, Gizem Aksu, Roger Sala Reyner, Jan Burkhardt
Silvia Mariotti, Anime di Cristallo
curated by Matilde Galletti
In Anime di Cristallo, a project promoted by Karussell APS, the works of Silvia Mariotti investigate the transformation of nature and explore hypothetical life forms generated through the union of natural and artificial, human and non- human elements.
Inspired by the biodiversity and lush vegetation of the Azores Islands, the artist embraces processes of transformation and contamination through different methodologies and materials. Through a combination of photography and sculpture, Mariotti simulates hybrid ecosystems in which imaginary creatures — born from the fusion of organic and inorganic elements — appear as contemporary fossils or evolving biomes.
Following her artistic residency at Re-Act Contemporary Art Laboratory on the island of Terceira, Mariotti brought back fragments of the Azorean landscape and transformed her studio in Milan into a laboratory, setting up vitrines in which she experimented with organic materials. These biological experiments were carried out in collaboration with an environmental engineer and a conservator-restorer. Microorganisms colonized the photographic papers, generating hybrid and visionary landscapes, formations evoking the caldeiras — the volcanic pools of São Miguel Island. Inorganic patinas were also created through chemical processes that produced precipitations and, consequently, mineral encrustations and formations on the sculptures.
The result is a transforming ecosystem made of crystallizations and images that suspend in time what is otherwise destined for decomposition. The project was first presented at MUHNAC – Museu Nacional de História Natural e da Ciência in Lisbon, then at IAC – Instituto Açoriano da Cultura in Angra do Heroísmo, Terceira Island (2025), and in recent months in a solo exhibition at Rivafiorita (Porto San Giorgio–Fermo) for Karussell APS.
Project Partner
Re-Act Contemporary Art Laboratory, Angra do Heroísmo, Terceira Island, Azores
Cultural Partners
MUHNAC – Museu Nacional de História Natural e da Ciência
ULisboa – Universidade de Lisboa
IAC – Instituto Açoriano da Cultura, Angra do Heroísmo, Terceira Island, Azores MACTE – Museo di Arte Contemporanea, Termoli
Technical Partner
Savelli Ascensori
Project Manager
Matilde Galletti
Project Coordinator