NEREIDA PATRICIA

The artist was commissioned to create a new site-specific mixed-media fountain which she has been building on location during her residency at Fountainhead in Miami. The fountain made mostly from foam, cement and glass beads, references themes of diasporic mythology, trans poetics and identity and ecological collapse. With iconic imagery that points to both Damballah, the Haitian lwa often represented by a snake and understood to be the creator of all life, the scientifically modified trans body, and the detritus of the post-apocalyptic, the fountain is a primordial soup of sorts that speaks to both the scarcity of water and our birthing and creation from its source. 

Nereida Patricia is a visual artist and poet based in Chicago who has recently moved to Brooklyn, NY. Patricia’s practice spans sculpture, painting, and performance, and explores themes of mythology, trans poetics, and identity. Her work draws from postcolonial and Black feminist theory, Peruvian and Caribbean symbolism, as well as autobiographical fragments, to explore trans femininity, violence, gender, race, and sexual politics. She has studied at The New School and holds Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute Chicago. Her work has been exhibited at venues such as DUPLEX, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit; Eric Firestone Gallery, New York; Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago and more.