"Diorama of Memory" August 2025

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"Layers of Memory: A Diorama of Remembrance"

Contemporary Archaeology: The Mark as a Thought on Material

 

This series of works is an invitation to a personal and multi-layered journey—not toward a familiar geographical landscape, but into the internal landscape where time, memory, and existence are inscribed in matter. The series challenges the viewer with questions about how the past and present coexist, continuing an artistic tradition concerned with the "Memory of the Material"—the idea that the materials themselves carry the weight of information and history.

 

Context: An Anchor in Times of Chaos

 

The series, "A Diorama of Remembrance," was created in Lisbon, August 2025. It emerged during an artistic journey undertaken amidst a reality of war and open wounds. Within encompassing chaos, the works offer an intimate attempt to grasp onto memory. The metaphorical idea of a diorama—a three-dimensional model presenting a specific scene—is transformed here into a small world that narrates a story of time, era, and experience.

This is an artistic response and an attempt to connect with existence, seeking to create a preservation of fleeting moments in a tangible form, serving as an anchor in times of uncertainty. The works do not seek to reflect reality but rather to generate an internal reality that processes its impact.

 

The Process: Layered Construction and Archaeological Dig

 

The creation of the series involved a complex process of layered construction that echoes an archaeological dig. The substrate becomes a tablet where each layer—of graphite, watercolor, collage, and natural materials—is an accumulated testimony to the passage of time and touch.

• Archive of Touch: Material elements like crumpled paper, tape, and stains function as an archive of touch, where the surface bears traces of memory, both personal and collective.

• Material Contrasts: The series is characterized by a constant dialogue between contrasts: between the heavy and raw quality of the material mass and the light and airy quality of the drawing. This tension creates depth, transforming the work into an energetic action that moves between strong physical presence and subtle spirituality.

• Time as Material: The drying time of the layers and the time required for the details to be revealed become part of the meaning. The act of scraping off part of the layers and exposing the underlying surface serves as an artistic tool for addressing memory and forgetting.

 

The Floating Lines: The Mark as a Thought

 

Across the massive materiality, the delicate lines of the drawing appear as an act of thought attempting to decipher the accumulated matter. These linear marks, which sometimes resemble internal roadmaps or ancient ciphers, are not a dictated narrative. They invite the viewer to draw near and engage in prolonged contemplation.

The initial works in the series may be an echo of internal messages, reminiscent of ancient cave paintings—sources of non-verbal communication that fundamentally merge the figurative (subtle silhouettes or figures) within the abstract background (the materiality). These lines serve as the bridge between the "geological" layers and the "human" memory.

 

Contemporary Archaeology: Freedom of Interpretation

 

Instead of imitating or documenting memory, the works create an experience of contemporary archaeology, inviting the viewer to become a personal interpreter. The combination of abstraction with non-traditional materials incorporates a post-digital sensitivity, responding to the virtual world through a return to the weight and presence of the physical.

When hints of a "Fissure in Light," a "Wound in the Landscape," or the silhouette of a figure are revealed, they are not intended to dictate meaning. They transform the dialogue into part of a collective memory that shifts with the gaze, generating a feeling of contemporary nostalgia—a sense that the viewer is witnessing documents from a world that has been forgotten or has yet to be born.

The series thus operates simultaneously as an archaeology of the moment, an internal roadmap, and a meditation on time. Its power lies precisely in the tension between the heavy and the light, the permanent and the temporary, the raw and the ethereal.