Cardinal Directions, 2025
Installation with wicker baskets, nautical rope, bulrush, esparto, cane and llatra
Variable dimensions.
Jessica Stockholder presents an installation that activates the material languages of the Mediterranean, a territory where plant fibers, nets, and braids have historically been inseparable from the daily lives of fishing communities. Known for transforming everyday objects into chromatic and spatial architectures, the artist here turns her gaze to the crafts that have sustained relationships in coastal territories for centuries.
For this work, the artist collaborates with Mallorcan artisans Pep Toni Ferrer and Magdalena Vidal, whose work contributes to the preservation of traditional techniques such as llatra, a braiding technique using palm leaves employed throughout the Mediterranean to make baskets, hampers, and containers linked to both agriculture and fishing. Through this collaboration, the artist creates a suspended structure composed of baskets from diverse origins, nautical ropes, and fibers such as esparto grass, bova, wicker, and cane—materials deeply rooted in the artisanal culture of the coast.
The installation evokes the ephemeral architecture that accompanies the lives of fishermen: nets drying in the sun, ropes hardened by salt, baskets holding fishing gear. Stockholder thus summons maritime knowledge through its material traces, the ways of working that have guided the relationship between bodies, tools, and the aquatic horizon for generations.
In this cartography of volumes, the baskets act as buoys or cardinal points on an imaginary map. Amid tensions, knots, and precarious balances, Stockholder transforms functional objects into a speculative framework that proposes new visual and spatial relationships. Thus, Cardinal Directions links tradition and contemporaneity to underscore the enduring relevance of Mediterranean trades, celebrating the manual skills and communal efforts that have shaped life by the sea.
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