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EXHIBITION VIEWS

Video: Pia Männikkö and Felipe de Ávila Franco

RUMBLING WITHIN
Galleria Sculptor - Finland
May 2024

As our reality undergoes a gradual metamorphosis under the sway of voracious technological machinery, the organic rhythms of the natural world seem to fade deeper into obscurity. Through a delicate interplay of form and material, the works in this exhibition invite viewers to contemplate the intrinsic connections between the development and decay of human society, drawing subtle parallels between the materiality and function of modern technologies, the exploitation of mineral resources, and the degradation of our planet’s ecosystems. 

These ceramic pieces, materialized through 3D automated layering machines, contain traces of residual sand and salt from deep-sea oi drilling process, capturing an essential aspect of the modern human condition, where the existence of organic bodies is intrinsically intertwined with fossil fuel industry and the mechanical structures that permeate all levels of society.

 

SUBJECTIVE SUBSTANCE
Porvoon Arthall - Finland
September / October 2023

The exhibition investigates matters pertaining to the various manifestations of the energy concept. Through experimental approaches, projections of light onto reflective surfaces, and arrangements incorporating fossil fuel residues and electromechanical systems, the artworks transmute the phenomenological hues of notions of energy. The works navigate the conceptual subjectivity of this notion, serving as a pivotal element for speculating on energy as a substance that not only inhabits but also connects the realms of reality, fiction, and spiritual.

The realization of this exhibition was supported by Svenska Kulturfonden and Arts Promotion Centre Finland TAIKE. Special thanks for the collaboration and support of Innobrand Oy. 

Photos: Leandro Lefa @llefa / Felipe de Ávila Franco

HOW TO POSTPONE THE END
HAM - Helsinki Art Museum - Finland
October / November 2021
 
Through the contrast of concepts such as degradation, development, and ancestrality, the exhibition suggests an encounter among modern and rudimentary technologies and a clash between scientific perspectives and the ancient and grounded ‘cosmovision’ to mitigate this fearful, disturbed, and impersonal corporeity of the so absent contexts of the present, in the attempt to avoid or at least to postpone the end.

The title of the show is inspired from the book "Ideas to Postpone the End of the World", by Ailton Krenak, a Brazilian indigenous leader, writer, activist. The exhibition invites reflections concerning the intrinsic relations between the degradation of ecosystems caused by modern large-scale industrial processes and the long history of exploitation of natural resources, invasion of territories, and the extermination of populations and cultures produced by the still ongoing colonization processes around the world, including in South America, where the artist comes from. For the video documentation access the link.

Photos: © HAM / Kirsi Halkola / Felipe de Ávila Franco
 

Video: Luis Sartori do Vale

RESIDUE RESIDES
Third Space Gallery - Helsinki, Finland
October 2018

The exhibition Residue Resides comprises works produced over varied mediums such as sculpture, installation, photography and video developed through an extensive research approaching the biggest environmental disaster ever registered in Brazilian history. In November 2015 an iron ore tailings dam suffered a catastrophic failure in a Brazilian countryside area, spilling 60 million m3 of iron waste residue in the environment. It destroyed local villages and compromised the water supply of larger cities along the 700 Km of the Doce River, which was destroyed by the mudflows before they reached the Atlantic ocean 17 days later.

The works presented in this exhibition explore different aspects of the residue and its incorporation into artistic process over varied mediums such as sculpture, video installation and photography, discussing also how the environmental crisis of our times manifests a parallel of a material and a immaterial dystopia.
 

VARIOUS EXHIBITIONS
2017 - 2025

Felipe de Ávila Franco's work has been already displayed in South America, Europe, Asia and in the United States. His works integrate distinguished collections such as the Museum of Brazilian Art FAAP, in São Paulo, the Helsinki Arts Museum HAM, and the Museum of Contemporary Art KIASMA, in Helsinki, Finland.

Photos: Leandro Lefa @llefa / Felipe de Ávila Franco

 

 

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All images © Felipe de Ávila Franco. The use of any image from this website requires written permission from the artist.

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