Uploaded September 2024 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Artist, rafa esparza’s installation Dispatches de Abajo begins with the ground as a realm in and of itself, made up mostly of soil and sediments that have a function to sustain life and decompose it. These unearthed objects or artifacts are witnesses to time and to the subterranean.
Through the adobe paintings, esparza imagines subterranean landscapes and juxtaposes potential proximities amongst expected relatives and unlikely paired objects. In the adobe sculptures, replicas of extracted objects share sounds of deep earth’s tectonic movement. The adobe installation is immersive surrounding us with earthen material that allows us to experience a continuum of time, which is disrupted by shaping ancient earth material into contemporary works exposing us to the temporality of the above-earth realm.
Come see Dispatches de Abajo by rafa esparza and more in our major exhibition, Calli: The Art of Xicanx Peoples, and experience intergenerational, feminist, queer, and Xicanx-Indigenous artworks now on view in our Great Hall.
Build Belonging Together. Visit the Oakland Museum of California – OMCA for short.
w: museumca.org
ig: @oaklandmuseumca
fb: @museumca
e: hi@museumca.org
a: 1000 Oak St., Oakland, CA 94607
Artist, rafa esparza’s installation Dispatches de Abajo begins with the ground as a realm in and of itself, made up mostly of soil and sediments that have a function to sustain life and decompose it. These unearthed objects or artifacts are witnesses to time and to the subterranean.
Through the adobe paintings, esparza imagines subterranean landscapes and juxtaposes potential proximities amongst expected relatives and unlikely paired objects. In the adobe sculptures, replicas of extracted objects share sounds of deep earth’s tectonic movement. The adobe installation is immersive surrounding us with earthen material that allows us to experience a continuum of time, which is disrupted by shaping ancient earth material into contemporary works exposing us to the temporality of the above-earth realm.
Come see Dispatches de Abajo by rafa esparza and more in our major exhibition, Calli: The Art of Xicanx Peoples, and experience intergenerational, feminist, queer, and Xicanx-Indigenous artworks now on view in our Great Hall.
Build Belonging Together. Visit the Oakland Museum of California – OMCA for short.
w: museumca.org
ig: @oaklandmuseumca
fb: @museumca
e: hi@museumca.org
a: 1000 Oak St., Oakland, CA 94607
