Mountain brother

The Slow Pace of the Body that is Skin (O tempo lento do corpo que é pele, 2012) is a shapeless sculpture made with the technique of nozinhos, or small knots, originally hailing from the mountains near Rio de Janeiro.

Neto links up the concepts of skin and landscape: “The idea of skin is very important in all my works: the skin as a place of existence, of dialogue between our internal and external vibrations. I see the body largely as a landscape—as a sea, a field—and sculpture is a landscape. Looking inside us is a common practice today, and this introspection is a motive that inspires my work, the micro-world of the landscape, the biological landscape. The Slow Pace is a clear example of this, since it can be interpreted as a mountain and/or an animal (…) In this piece, the idea of the transition from the body to the landscape becomes clear. This transition is crucial. My works are usually transparent; the fabric part of the pieces is what confers transparency. In this work, the opposite happens. The content is hidden and the carpet shows its own volume, perhaps symbolizing the volume of something that is concealed. Here, space-time is related more with the tiny knots, the cells, which make up the surface. The piece was made by the COOPA-ROCA women's cooperative. To me, there is something interesting about the time they take to do their work, knot by knot; this is the time they take in revealing the invisible content.”