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Drought

Drought ©EP 2024

Bulgaria, 2021

Installation of four unique objects + video 8:18 min, 126 × 30 × 30 cm (each)

edition 3+1

Purchased from the artist in 2024


Nalbantova’s latest work, part of the Drought project, is a series of handmade blocks of soap which contain ingredients extracted from four sites affected by drought: a lake, a river, a puddle in a depopulated village and the sea. Each soap cube addresses the specific problems of the particular landscape transformed by drought. The soap cube from the seaside, for instance, contains seawater, sand, algae and concrete. The last ingredient is a reference to the illegal building of a concrete barrier on the beach, one example among many cases of unauthorised construction which destroy the environment. The artist describes her work as a protest which turns into a ritual, and a ritual which turns into a protest. To make each soap block is to narrate the (hi)story of a place, of the social and political decisions and consequences shaping the existence of its people and the environment. Nalbantova draws attention to the ecological crisis and highlights the idea that all living organisms are interconnected and are part of a fragile natural balance.

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Drought

Maria NALBANTOVA

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