WE THE ENEMY (2019) is a series comprised of 41 bronze sculptures based on representations of the devil drawn from art history: historical paintings that portray Satan in hell, drawings, illustrations, and sculptures that represent evil embodied. Each figure defies normative moral standards of beauty, respectability, and behavior. Among this army of demons, there are characters who suggest sexual perversion – as typified by traditional catholic imagery.

Tania Candiani’s work often seeks to make explicit the discursive contents of artifacts and textual materials. Her work also evidences nostalgia for the obsolete. This sense of nostalgia also materializes in works she articulates around the invisible passing of time by creating awareness of such time. In Sobre el tiempo, wall pieces containing large numbers of common alarm clocks that resonate loudly, create a texture of time marking a constant presence.

Part of the Social Hieroglyphs series, the artwork connects art, architecture, engineering, and nature through the works of the English architect and gardener Joseph Paxton (1803–1865), the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer (1907–2012) and the Brazilian landscape designer and artist Roberto Burle Marx (1909–1994). The table surface shows images from the transformed Oca Building by Oscar Niemeyer: by constructing a digital maquette and using mirroring processes to alter the referent, the artist combines the gesture and sensuality of the design, presented here in a renewed way. Like a platform to be seen from above, the table houses several pristine plexiglas domes, beneath which different handmade Victoria regia water lilies are placed. Protected from external contamination, these encapsulated natural species reference Paxton and Burle Marx’s interest in tropical flora and nature’s role in constructing the modern world. The exquisitely handmade objects, created in collaboration with Brazilian artisans, are a tribute to the traditional textile work of women, which was historically undervalued as either decorative or merely utilitarian and thus undeserving of scholarly attention or public display. Bringing together high-tech industrial processes and handmade craftwork, the work challenges Adolf Loos’ idea of purity as stated in his ‘Ornament and Crime’ manifesto of 1910. By doing so, it aims to explore the relationships and inconsistencies between tropical nature, modernism, and contemporary life.

Newspapers whose denominations are somehow absolutes, such as Le Monde (The World) and El País (The Country), are covered by a blanket of lead that allows for only a glimpse of their titles, blocking any proper reading. Lead, by virtue of progressive applications of atomic energy, has become increasingly important as shielding against radiation thanks to its excellent corrosion resistance. The material is, however, extremely toxic to the human body. Komatsu’s lead blanket thus both protects us from the power of the media and contaminates us at the same time.