In Natural History and Other Ruins, Marcelo Moscheta observes transformations in the natural landscape whether manmade, made by himself as agent or by natural processes of erosion and sedimentation. The artist presents works in a variety of techniques giving these metamorphoses a monumental or iconographic character. By proportionately juxtaposing man and nature as motivators of these transformations, Moscheta humanizes nature, bringing it closer to a personalized spirit.
In the gallery’s main hall two opposing processes are present: on the ground, the work Melancholia, 2018, a series of bronze cast meteorites is organized as if a storm of atmospheric debris had fallen from the heavens, entered and occupied the space. On the wall, The Great Tree, 2014/2018, is a monumental drawing representing a trunk of a Red Cedar tree in real scale. The drawing has been fractioned in parts where some parts of its structure has been replaced by plates of processed wood. The artist suggests through representation evidence of the industrialization process of nature: the tree, separated different compartments for use by industry, construction and also art. The work itself repeats this process. The origin of this work, the drawing, was made for the Vancouver Biennale in Canada in 2014; and, through the now fractioned representation, Moscheta submits his own work to the design of progress.
This friction between the creative impulse of nature and the processual arrangements of man becomes evident in series of works such as The Time, 2018, and Still, 2018. In both series, pages of encyclopedias have excerpts of their text erased giving them a different character from the erstwhile scientific tone. These are pages that bring images of a brutal nature such as volcanic eruptions or residues of rocky materials after explosions. Attached to their frames, these pages become platforms that support elements processed from nature such as basilica rocks or concrete test bodies. The text of one of the images showing a volcanic eruption, reads: “And they also understood that nothing – no mountains, rivers, continents or seas – is eternal on Earth.” Another passage reads: “… profoundly altered man’s concept of himself, and his idea of his place in the world.” These new poetic possibilities of the texts allow for another understanding of the original analytical / scientific descriptions.
The series that lends it title to the exhibition, The Natural History and Other Ruins, 2018, is com- posed of fragments of an encyclopedia from the 1970s describing the formation of the earth and the development of life on the planet. Entitled chapters (chapter 1, chapter 3, etc.), the works are organized in compositions of parts of the encyclopedia with photolytic images of a mining industry sided with sheets of oxidized steel which textures resemble the rocky mountain landscapes of the mining company. The suggestive titles of the Chapters in this series are evident in the compositions: “Evolution of the Species,” “Domesticated Nature,” “A Laboratory of Evolution.”
The same mining company appears in Moscheta’s first experiment with a video installation, O engenho do mundo, 2018. In a black room, two monitors display images of this friction between human and natural processes: one of the monitors shows the mining company’s process of extraction and production of crushed stone; the other monitor shows a geyser in the Atacama desert where natural gases are expelled from the earth. The two monitors are arranged so that the two processes appear to be unfinished, opposing and converging in on one another.
In Natural History and Other Ruins, Marcelo Moscheta observes transformations in the natural landscape whether manmade, made by himself as agent or by natural processes of erosion and sedimentation. The artist presents works in a variety of techniques giving these metamorphoses a monumental or iconographic character. By proportionately juxtaposing man and nature as motivators of these transformations, Moscheta humanizes nature, bringing it closer to a personalized spirit.
In the gallery’s main hall two opposing processes are present: on the ground, the work Melancholia, 2018, a series of bronze cast meteorites is organized as if a storm of atmospheric debris had fallen from the heavens, entered and occupied the space. On the wall, The Great Tree, 2014/2018, is a monumental drawing representing a trunk of a Red Cedar tree in real scale. The drawing has been fractioned in parts where some parts of its structure has been replaced by plates of processed wood. The artist suggests through representation evidence of the industrialization process of nature: the tree, separated different compartments for use by industry, construction and also art. The work itself repeats this process. The origin of this work, the drawing, was made for the Vancouver Biennale in Canada in 2014; and, through the now fractioned representation, Moscheta submits his own work to the design of progress.
This friction between the creative impulse of nature and the processual arrangements of man becomes evident in series of works such as The Time, 2018, and Still, 2018. In both series, pages of encyclopedias have excerpts of their text erased giving them a different character from the erstwhile scientific tone. These are pages that bring images of a brutal nature such as volcanic eruptions or residues of rocky materials after explosions. Attached to their frames, these pages become platforms that support elements processed from nature such as basilica rocks or concrete test bodies. The text of one of the images showing a volcanic eruption, reads: “And they also understood that nothing – no mountains, rivers, continents or seas – is eternal on Earth.” Another passage reads: “… profoundly altered man’s concept of himself, and his idea of his place in the world.” These new poetic possibilities of the texts allow for another understanding of the original analytical / scientific descriptions.
The series that lends it title to the exhibition, The Natural History and Other Ruins, 2018, is com- posed of fragments of an encyclopedia from the 1970s describing the formation of the earth and the development of life on the planet. Entitled chapters (chapter 1, chapter 3, etc.), the works are organized in compositions of parts of the encyclopedia with photolytic images of a mining industry sided with sheets of oxidized steel which textures resemble the rocky mountain landscapes of the mining company. The suggestive titles of the Chapters in this series are evident in the compositions: “Evolution of the Species,” “Domesticated Nature,” “A Laboratory of Evolution.”
The same mining company appears in Moscheta’s first experiment with a video installation, O engenho do mundo, 2018. In a black room, two monitors display images of this friction between human and natural processes: one of the monitors shows the mining company’s process of extraction and production of crushed stone; the other monitor shows a geyser in the Atacama desert where natural gases are expelled from the earth. The two monitors are arranged so that the two processes appear to be unfinished, opposing and converging in on one another.




















