XVA Gallery in Dubai invites everyone to attend Rooted in Drawing, UAE-based artist Elizabeth Dorazio’s solo exhibition that showcases her new artworks from the I Went on a Trip series. Curated by Magnólia Costa (an art critic, independent curator, and professor who specialises in 17th-century French-Italian art), the show will end on 30 November 2023.
The mixed-media works on view are handmade woollen tapestries based on original wooden collages. The tapestries are created in collaboration with the Afghan female artisans hired by the Fatima Bint Mohamed Bin Zayed Initiative (FBMI). It should be noted that Dorazio often works together with traditional arts practitioners from across the world.
In the artist’s practice, collage ascends from drawing by cutting out images with scissors, a procedure adopted in compositions evoking marine life. In the exhibition, the works from the artist’s On Nature collection are also displayed. These are wood panels (fragments of discarded wood from furniture or decommissioned shipping vessels) with pyrographed images depicting foliage.
About the artist
Elizabeth Dorazio (b. 1957, Araguari, Brazil) graduated from the Guignard University of Art of Minas Gerais (Brazil) with a BFA in Visual Arts in 1982. She pursued her education at the Institute of Art and Restoration (Florence, Italy), where she studied Ancient Italian Art Techniques. Later, the artist entered Abendschule (Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main, Germany) to study Drawing. In 2023, Dorazio obtained an MFA in Art and Media from NYU Abu Dhabi (UAE).
Dorazio lives and works between Brazil and the Emirates, so the visual cultures and popular techniques of both countries influence her art. The other things which inspire her are instability, shifting surfaces, and the cellular. However, the main source of her inspiration is nature. In her practice that deploys drawing, etching, collage, woodwork, and installation, the artist explores the mysteries of human relations to the cosmos and the world of nature. Employing handmade paper, reused wood, and textile fibres, she produces images taken from scientific publications and the internet: images of manifestations from nature. Her artworks may feature depictions of human organs, single-celled bodies, ecosystems, galaxies, fossils, or traces of life forms that replicate in DNA chains.
The artist has showcased her creations in numerous exhibitions including Synthesis (Warehouse421, Abu Dhabi, UAE, 2023); Art Here – Richard Mille Prize (Louvre Museum Abu Dhabi, 2022); Drawings & Editions (a solo show) (XVA Art Gallery, Dubai, UAE, 2021); 43°Sarp-Salão de Arte de Ribeirão Preto (Museu de Arte de Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil, 2018); Mysterium Esse Revelandum (a solo show) (Kunstverein Familie Montez, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, 2014); 4° Salão dos Artistas Sem Galeria (Zipper Galeria, São Paulo, SP, Brazil, 2013); and many others.
The curatorial projects in which Dorazio has taken part include the Existenzielle Korrespondenzen exhibition (Frankfurt am Main/São Paulo, 2016), Blue Connection (Frankfurt am Main/São Paulo/Sorocaba, 2010-11), and Schweizer 9 (Frankfurt am Main, 2008).
Her art pieces have been added to such public collections as Museu de Arte Contemporânea (Sorocaba, SP, Brazil); Centro Universitário Maria Antonia (São Paulo, SP, Brazil); Centro Cultural Correios (Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil); and Kunstverein Familie Montez (Frankfurt am Main, Germany).
You can get more information about Rooted in Drawing on the show’s official web page.
You might also be interested in visiting Tethys by Nabil Nahas.
