4me4you recently had the pleasure of visiting PACE London Gallery which featured the artist Sonia Gomes.
Sonia Gomes is a pioneering Brazilian artist whose practice intricately weaves together secondhand textiles and everyday materials, such as driftwood, wire, and furniture, into powerful abstract sculptures. Her works reclaim and reinterpret Afro-Brazilian traditions and feminist artistic practices that have long been marginalised. Through her delicate yet transformative approach, Gomes challenges the boundaries of materiality and memory, creating art that is at once deeply personal and universally resonant.
Recognised as one of Brazil’s foremost contemporary artists, Gomes is celebrated for her ability to infuse discarded materials with profound cultural and historical significance. In 2015, she was the only Brazilian artist invited by the late Okwui Enwezor to participate in the Arsenale exhibition at the 56th Venice Biennale.
Three years later, in 2018, she became the first living Black woman to receive a solo exhibition at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo (MASP). Most recently, in 2024, Gomes returned to Venice to present her work in the Holy See Pavilion at the 60th Venice Biennale.
For this show, she expands her practice by incorporating bronze for the first time. These new sculptures, casts of tree burls and branches enveloped in fabric, extend her meditation on vulnerability and strength.
Complementing them, a series of wall-mounted works made from reclaimed wood and gilded with gold leaf fuse historical and contemporary aesthetics, reflecting her sustained interest in transformation and contrast.
Artist: Sonia Gomes
