AR.RASTO Exhibition

In this exhibition, the artist Xana Sousa (Lisbon, 1986) approaches the notion of the “trace” (‘rasto’ in Portuguese) in the sense of an imprint and a shift: that which remains after the passing of time and of movement. Its origins stem from organic materials collected from rivers: plant fragments, driftwood, sediment, understood not as waste but as vessels for memory and experience. Alongside nests, herbariums, botanical drawings and other installations thought out specifically for this exhibition, AR.RASTRO (meaning ‘dragging’ or ‘trawling’ in Portuguese) takes shape as a sentient landscape where the natural and built world intertwine by holding close, listening and caring.

The temporality running through this project is that of prolonged time: the time of sedimentation, repetition and waiting. This notion is present both in the material processes and in the over-twenty-year journey that the pieces in the exhibition have been on, as well as the work with the Fundação Bissaya Barreto’s archives and with the Jardim Botânico da Universidade de Coimbra. Taking an intuitive, non-extractive approach, Xana Sousa does not impose forms but rather acts as a wayfellow for the materials themselves on the processes they have already started, paying close heed to their folds, build-ups and balances, while acknowledging the persistence of biological and cultural flows within them.

Here, the river appears to us as a living archive. A historically mediated body, one that is now vulnerable: the river’s ability to persist speaks directly to our relationship with the world around us. As an archive, the river does not preserve (itself), but rather transforms (itself). Contemplating the trace from this standpoint means taking on an ethical responsibility: paying attention to the washed-up, the piled-up and the seemingly minor as valid forms of knowledge.

Rather than offering unequivocal readings or foreclosed images, Xana Sousa presents AR.RASTO as an ongoing process in which the pieces, much like the river, remain open to becoming. In so doing, she reminds us that all forms are provisional and that existing in the world means interacting with living things through reciprocity and respect.

Laura González Palacios

Exhibition Curator