ROSANA PAULINO PRESENTS NEW WORK AT MENDES WOOD DM PARIS
A botanical mythology where Black women's bodies and Brazilian vegetation become one.
Opening this October, the Paris-based gallery Mendes Wood DM presents Bloom in the Sunlight, Dream in the Moonlight, a solo exhibition of new work by Rosana Paulino (b. 1967). Her work centers on social, ethnic, and gender issues faced, in particular, by Black women in Brazilian society.
Focusing on the various types of violence suffered by this population, due to racism and the lasting legacy of slavery, Paulino explores the impact of memory on psychosocial constructions. Her practice, which is unquestionably fundamental to Brazilian art, has developed into the reconstructing of images and, in turn, of memory. Bringing together female figures and their respective historical elements, her new paintings, drawings and sculptures map colonial structures and their psychic traces onto the social and aesthetic fabric of our time.
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Rosana Paulino, Comigo Ninguém Pode (da série Senhora das Plantas), 2026
Her research includes the construction of myths, not only as aesthetic pillars but also as psychic influence-makers, and her new works in the exhibition introduce references that intersect the artist's personal history with the phenomenological history of Brazil.
For the exhibition, the artist presents new paintings and drawings from the series Senhora das Plantas and Criaturas do Dia e da Noite, in which she explores ways of conceiving a psychology for Black women within the reality in which they live. In the process, she depicts these female figures within the context of Brazilian vegetation, with limbs that transform into tree roots, hair that grows like leaves, or fingers that blossom into flowers in both daytime and nighttime settings. In addition, a new series of sculptures is currently in development.
The exhibition follows the artist's representation of Brazil at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia alongside Adriana Varejão. In October 2026, she will be the subject of a major solo show at The New School, New York.
Bloom in the Sunlight, Dream in the Moonlight will be on display from October 19 to December 19, 2026 at Mendes Wood DM, 25 Place des Vosges, 75003 Paris, France.
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