Anca Benera &
Arnold Estefán
September — November 2021
→ Stuttgart
Anca Benera and Arnold Estefan's works reveal the invisible patterns behind certain historical or geopolitical narratives. Their recent work investigates the phenomenon of man-made landscapes around the world, where the making and marking of landscapes (as a form of spatial modification) goes hand in hand with heightened state violence and the overexploitation of resources.
During their fellowship at the Akademie Schloss Solitude they are working on a project titled "From the Black Forest to the Black Sea via Namib desert", which extends their recent investigation on the German colonial past (Deutsch-Südwestafrika) and the cross-connection between distinct geographies and industries that share a common mineral: the diamond.
Recent exhbitioms include: Subnature, Trafo Gallery, Budapest (2021-solo); 39th EVA International | Ireland’s Biennial (2021); Potential Worlds 2: Eco-Fictions at the Migros Museum in Zurich (2021); The Normal, Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh (2021); Land, Ownership and Commons, public art project, Semmering, Austria (2021); Slow Life, Ludwig Museum, Budapest (2021); Overview Effect, Museum of Contemporary Art Belgrade, Serbia (2020-2021); Artistic Enquiries into Plants, tranzit.ro/Bucharest (2019); The Last Particles, 40mcube, Rennes (2019, solo); 3rd Art Encounters Biennial, Timisoara (2019); Persona, MUCEM Marseille (2019); Manufacturing Nature / Naturalizing The Synthetic, FRAC des Pays de la Loire, Nantes (2018); Natural Histories. Traces of the Political, MUMOK Wien (2017).
The residency is organised in the frame of Akademie Schloss Solitude's Eastern European Network exchange program.