CAROLINA CAYCEDO: BETWEEN VENICE AND SÃO PAULO, RIVERS AND RESISTANCE

Carolina Caycedo (United Kingdom, 1978) is participating in the current edition of the Venice Biennale while opening Confluences, her first solo exhibition in Brazil, at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand (MASP), on view from July 3. Born in London and raised in Colombia, the artist grew up on the banks of the Magdalena River, one of the country's most important waterways, deeply affected by dam construction — a recurring subject in her practice. 

In Venice, Caycedo presents three works from the series We Save Our Seed for the Following Season (2023), tapestries combining Jacquard weaving, printed cotton twill, and organic materials. As curator Atabey fka Carlos Maria Romero notes, the pieces "honour women who develop and keep land-based knowledge": one celebrates Japanese-American women incarcerated by the United States government during World War II who planted gardens to nourish the bodies and souls of their compatriots; another portrays Meda DeWitt, a Tlingit healer and activist in Alaska, gathering crowberries with her daughter; and a third represents Ella Besaw (1902–1990), medicine woman of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians in Wisconsin, among sacred plants. Also on view in Venice is Ñañay Kculli ~ S'oam Bawi Wenag ~ Kiik K'úum (2024), three wooden seeds suspended in jute nets referencing the Three Sisters, an Indigenous agricultural technique practiced throughout North and Central America.

At MASP, the exhibition takes its title from a new installation created collaboratively during the People's Summit held alongside COP30 in Belém, Pará. The work brings together T-shirts, flags, and banners produced by participants in the gathering, evoking confluence not only of waterways but of people, cultures, and forms of resistance. The show spans photography, installation, video, performance, and drawing, and is curated by Isabella Rjeille.

Among the works on view is the Cosmotarrayas series (2016–ongoing), sculptures inspired by the way fishers hang their nets from tree trunks to dry, combining artisanal fishing nets with objects collected by the artist. Also included is My Feminine Lineage of Struggle (2018–2019), from MASP's collection, featuring drawn portraits of activists including Marielle Franco, Tuíra Kayapó, Dorothy Stang, and Ana Laide Barbosa.

As part of the program, Caycedo will perform Atarraya on Saturday, July 4, at the museum's Free Span (Vão Livre). Following its presentation in São Paulo, the exhibition will travel to El Museo del Barrio in New York.