Dan Lie will take over the Octagon of the Pinacoteca Luz Building with one of the largest “entity- installations” of their career, created in dialogue with the monumental scale of the museum’s central room. Curated by Thierry Freitas, the work is made from organic materials, exploring alterity with visible and non-visible species—such as decaying matter, plants, bacteria, fungi and other organisms.
In 2024, Dan Lie celebrates the 10-year anniversary of their first solo institutional exhibition. At the Pinacoteca, the project commissioned for the Octagon is a continuation of the artist’s research into organic processes with “others-beyond-humans.” The installation is characterized by a work that occurs procedurally: while flora and fungi will sprout and grow, other elements will decay, inviting visitors to engage with coexistence with these beings and their cycles.
“The Pinacoteca’s 2024 program focuses on territory, ecology, and the environment. Bringing a disruptive and experimental work like Dan Lie’s to the center of our main building underscores both the Octagon’s vocation for experimentation and our commitment to the subjects addressed by Lie. Their installation is a living presence at the heart of the museum,” says Thierry Freitas.
About the installation
Breaking with the logic of the Octagon space as a passageway, visitors must access the exhibition via the side entrance. Lie chose to preserve the side door, which was the building’s main entrance on Tiradentes Avenue until 1996. Inside, the public is greeted by large structures filled with plant matter, the “membras,” which act as an incubator for the proliferation of the organic world. The installation is encircled by a large arrangement of fresh chrysanthemums, which will gradually dry over the course of the exhibition. The spiral assembly goes from floor to ceiling, surrounded by clay urns filled with rice, which in the fermentation process will foster the growth of fungi.
Upon entering the space, visitors are invited to linger, given that for Dan Lie, the work is created precisely through its different possible interpretations. The work is an invitation to contemplation, so that the public can create an intimate relationship with the installation. “Accessibility is key to this work. There is a beautiful process in art, which is this democratic principle that can cross barriers of social class, culture, and different levels of education. This is a proposal for experience. In fact, we are very curious about how visitors will relate to the images, presences and life forms that are here,” says the artist.
To let it go is a sensory experience that encourages people to return whenever possible, since with each visit the smells and materials are transformed, and it is possible to observe cycles of life and death.
at Pinacoteca de São Paulo
until February 16, 2025