Elisa Strinna

wetenschap & techniek, sculptuur, natuur, Lichaam, keramiek, installatie, Experimenteel, Ecologie, Documentair, Diversiteit, Dekolonisatie, cross-over, beeldhouwen, Audiovisueel, Artistiek onderzoek, Analytisch

With my work, I create environmental installations that combine sculpture, light, sound, and film. Over the past eight years, I have focused primarily on porcelain, developing sculptures at various scales that explore interactions between human and non-human beings in various contexts—from the undersea world, where internet infrastructures intersect with marine life, to the human body and its connections with medicinal plants in traditional European healing practices. I approach these works as material explorations of relational systems and practices of world-making, grounded in a study of morphology. Alongside sculpture, I produce short films that merge documentary and fiction. These works bring attention to overlooked realities tied to extreme environments: from the Mediterranean Sea—its depths crossed by marine life and internet cables, its surface by African migrants seeking a different life—to Antarctica and the desert, where simulations of space missions reveal the implications of isolation and survival in hostile conditions, in a world where ecological catastrophe looms as a possible futures.

My Body is a Plant_Henbane
My Body is a Plant - Installation, porcelain, 2025, Photo: Gunnar Meier, RADIUS CCA, WE ARE ALL HOLOBIONTS! My Body is a Plant is an ongoing research project exploring the role of medicinal plants and our interdependence with the vegetal world. Developed in collaboration with Italian herbalist Karin Mecozzi, the project draws on phytotherapy, ethnobotany, and ecofeminist theories to investigate morphological and physiological parallels between plants and humans. This chapter, realized at the European Ceramic Work Center (EKWC), focuses on Hyoscyamus niger (henbane), a toxic plant long associated with healing and ritual. Its animal-like form and irregular flowers evoke its psychedelic and divinatory properties, while its medicinal uses for stomach and nervous system disorders mirror human anatomy and reveal hidden networks of interrelation.
My Body is A Plant, Leaves my blood
My Body is A Plant - Leaves my blood - Leaves my blood, porcelain 70 x 34 x34 cm, 2025 (hyoscyamus niger leaves innervations, stomach veins, hyoscyamus roots); photo: RADIUS CCA , WE ARE ALL HOLOBIONTS!
My Body is a Plant, Flowers my stomach
My Body is a Plant - Flowers my stomach - Flowers my stomach, porcelain, 65 x 68 x 44 cm, 2025 (stomach veins I human stomach I hyoscamus niger innervations and flower patterns) : photo: RADIUS CCA , WE ARE ALL HOLOBIONTS!
My Body is a Plant_Innervations
My Body is a Plant_Innervations - My Body is a Plant - Henbane, Innervations 01 (Leaf veins, hypogastric nerve) Wall sculpture | Porcelain, 2025 57 x 39 x 2 cm. photo: RADIUS CCA , WE ARE ALL HOLOBIONTS!
The Garden of Banes - The Garden of Banes, cement and iron, 90 x 50 cm, 95 x 55 cm, 2023 Photo: Parco Carta, Soveria Mannelli, (IT). The installation is constituted by two sculptures in concrete surrounded by a selection of plants that have historical relation to the persecution of women in Europe during the Inquisition, by being mentioned in the witch trial records, or by being associated with witchcraft from the local community of Soveria Mannelli.
The Garden of Banes - Henbane
My Body is a Plant - The Garden of Banes - Porcelain, 43 x 16 cm, 2023, private collection. The Garden of Banes explores phytotherapeutic practices and the history of women's persecution, examining plants for which women were dictated in the witchcraft trials.
My Body is a Plant - Roots my nervous sytem - Sculpture, 66 x 54 x 46 cm, porcelain painted with majolica technique, 2022; documenta fifteen, Kazimkuba, Kassel, 2022; photo by Nic Ash. "My Body is a Plant - Roots my nervous system" investigates the relationship between the medicinal proprieties of Valeriana officinalis' root and the human nervous system. In the sculpture, the plant's roots become one with our peripheral nervous system giving life to a hybrid body, which explores the relationships and correspondences between two different organisms.
Withered Season Flowers
Withered Season Flowers - Video, 6 minutes, 2022; Jimmie Durham and A Stick in the Forest by the Side of the Road, documenta fifteen, Kazimkuba, Kassel, 2022. Photo Nic Ash.
PEOPLE WILL MISS THE EARTH
People Will Miss the Earth - installation, mixed media (porcelain and film projection), 2022. Calm Before the Storm, Radius CCA, Delft, 2022-23; photo Gunnar Meier © RADIUS CCA. MICROGRAVITY LANDSCAPE. Sculpture, 36 x 32 cm, porcelain painted with majolica technique, 2022. THE ANTARCTIC GARDENER. Film, 24 minutes, 2022.
MICROGRAVITY LANDSCAPE
Microgravity Landscape - MICROGRAVITY LANDSCAPE. Sculpture, 36 x 32 cm, porcelain painted with majolica technique, 2022. Reproduction of scientific experiment showing gravitropic orientation of Mashroom Flammulina velutipes fruiting bodies grown in culture under different gravitational conditions.THE ANTARCTIC GARDENER. Film, 24 minutes, 2022.
The Antarctic Gardener - film, 24 minutes, 2022; photo: Calm Before the Storm, Radius CCA, Delft, 2022-23; photo Gunnar Meier © RADIUS CCA. Through the story of the confinement of edible plants and a queer scientist in an extreme environment, the Antarctic Gardener reflects on isolation's physical, emotional, and psychological effects, speculating on the future of space colonization.
The Antarctic Gardener
The Antarctic Gardener - The Antarctic Gardener follows an androgynous scientist confined to Antarctica, maintaining a closed ecosystem designed for space colonization. Surrounded only by plants, artificial suns, and virtual connections, they navigate the emotional weight of extreme isolation. Blending fiction with archive footage from the EDEN ISS project, the film blurs reality and science fiction to reveal a future already present. Inspired by research on Bio-regenerative Life Support Systems and the COVID-19 pandemic, it asks: if human life were possible only inside closed environments, what would existence become?
Blind Sun - Environmental Installation, 2021, mixed media (porcelain, porcelain plaster, cement, copper, alum crystals, water) variable dimension; Exhibition view, Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents at A Tale of a Tub, photo LNDW Studio Conceived as an immersive experience, it researches and thinks of the cable from a human and a cosmic perspective. It can be defined as a sort of Cosmological fantasy, a space of multiplicity, and unexpected relations/correspondences among very different beings.
Blind Sun - Fictional Geology
Blind Sun - Fictional Geology - 2018/2019; porcelain and porcelain plaster, 70 x 70 cm. Blind Sun at Tale of Tub, photo LNDWstudio;
Electrical Symbiosis / Blind Sun - Porcelain, 110 x 30 cm, 202. Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents at A Tale of a Tub, photo LNDW Studio. The undersea cables are inhabited by different marine species such as the sea anemone Metridium farcimen or the sponge Phylum Porifera. Even when buried under the sand, these creatures have been discovered to follow the fibers. It seems they are attracted by the electromagnetic fields emitted by the transoceanic cables, almost in symbiosis with electricity, disclosing new feral ecologies produced by the encounter of nature and human infrastructures.
Blind Sun
Blind Sun - 2018/2019; Earthenware and porcelain variable dimensions. Blind Sun at Culturgest Porto, photo Alexandre Delmar;
Blind Sun
Blind Sun - Blind Sun. Third Nature. Cybernetic Bodies; Stoneware, Porcelain and silicon. Variable dimension, 2019 Sol Cego, Fidelidade Arte, Lisbon, photo: Bruno Lopez
The Upwelling - Video, 6.45 m 2018/2019; photo, Alexander Delmar, Blind Sun, Culturgest Porto, 2020; The Upwelling follows some of the fiber optic cables going from Mazara del Vallo, Sicily, to Tunisia. The invisible flow of information goes together with the story of a young migrant telling his journey from Nigeria to Italy.
Hadean Stories
Hadean Stories - In the depths of the ocean, beyond the reach of human mastery, lies a mysterious territory known as Blind Sun. Inspired by the enigmatic era when the solar system was still forming, this Hadean ecosystem blurs the lines between organic life and human technology. The archaic underwater landscape, populated with sculptures and fossils inhabited by primitive biological species, is littered with contemporary transatlantic fiber-optic cables - the backbone of the global information transmission system known as the “cloud.” The cables emit electromagnetic fields that attract sea creatures such as anemones and sponges, which establish symbiotic relationships with the electricity, becoming one with the infrastructure. The hadean ecosystem is immersed in music obtained by translating the energy spectrum emanated by the molecules that make up the Sun. Relics from a time long past and a future yet to come form a complex and otherworldly terrain that recalls mysteries beyond our reach, both in the depths of the ocean and the enigmatic origins of our solar system. In the temporal porosity of this underwater territory, the ancient and modern, organic and technological, merge exploring the intricate interplay between organic life, human creations, and geological time.

WE ARE ALL HOLOBIONTS!

Datum:
Locatie: Radius CAA
In samenwerking met: curated by Niekolaas Johannes Lekkerkerk

My Body is a Plant

Datum:
Locatie: Galerie Caroline O'Breen

Amoreiras em Metamorfose

Datum:
Locatie: Museu Arpad Szenes-Vieira da Silva
In samenwerking met: curator Nuno Faria

EKWC

Datum:
Locatie: European Ceramic Work Center

The Antarctic Gardener,

Datum:
Locatie: Hong Kong
In samenwerking met: ART CENTRAL 2024, Art Fair

And Their World Was Beautiful,

Datum:
Locatie: Boijmans Depot
In samenwerking met: IAMAIR

Metabolic Staffage

Datum:
Locatie: LEHMANN + SILVA Gallery
In samenwerking met: curated by João Vasco Paiva

The Antarctic Gardener

Datum:
Locatie: Casa Encendida
In samenwerking met: She Makes Noise

The Antartic Gardener

Datum:
Locatie: Science New Wave Festival XVI
In samenwerking met: Imagine Science Films

The Garden of Banes,

Datum:
Locatie: Parco Carta
In samenwerking met: curated by Alessandro Fonte and Shawnette Poe

Blind Sun for Pole der Unzugänglichkeit

Datum:
Locatie: Galerie im Turm
In samenwerking met: curated by Johanna Janßen

The Antarctic Gardener

Datum:
Locatie: Eye Filmmuseum
In samenwerking met: New Harves

Becoming Earths

Datum:
Locatie: Galerie Caroline O'Breen
In samenwerking met: curated by Sonia D'Alto
https://carolineobreen.com/exhibition/becoming-earths/

Future of our Soil

Datum:
Locatie: LantarenVenster
In samenwerking met: International Film Festival Rotterdam, IFFR

Screening of the short film THE ANTARCTIC GARDENER

https://iffr.com/en/iffr/2023/films/the-antarctic-gardener

CALM BEFORE THE STORM

Datum:
Locatie: RADIUS CCA

Presentation of the short film THE ANTARCTIC GARDENER CALM BEFORE THE STORM is the fourth and final exhibition of the UNDERLAND year program. The eight artists in this group exhibition provide insight into the need for preservation and shelter when living environments become progressively volatile and unpredictable.

http://www.radius-cca.org/en/exhibitions/underland-chapter-4-calm-before-the-storm

Jimmie Durham and A Stick in the Forest by the Side of the Road

Datum:
Locatie: KazimKuba
In samenwerking met: documenta fifteen

mmie Durham & A Stick in the Forest by the Side of the Road is a collective that came about from the idea of ​​Jimmie Durham to gather together a group of artists to form “a community on the road” and to contribute in collaboration with him to documenta fifteen.

https://documenta-fifteen.de/en/lumbung-members-artists/jimmie-durham/

Blind Sun. Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents.

Datum:
Locatie: Tale of a Tub

In Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents, A Tale of A Tub, Rotterdam, presents three solo exhibitions of artists who, in different ways, research the phenomena of deep sea mining, coastal ecology and underwater cable network

http://a-tub.org/en/program/trade-winds-in-the-age-of-underwater-currents

Waves between us

Datum:
Locatie: Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Guarene
In samenwerking met: Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo

Collective exhibition curated by Alison Karasyk, Camille Regli, Katie Simpson Young Curators Residency Program 2020, coordinated by Lucrezia Calabrò Visconti

Blind Sun (Sol Cego)

Datum:
Locatie: Porto
In samenwerking met: Culturgest Porto

In the exhibition Blind Sun we are invited to take a journey through a series of microcosms in which we discover various and complementary aspects of our world. But the exhibition is not about the geology and history of the planet and the development of terrestrial platforms and surfaces; rather, Strinna's works form an interrogative, critical and poetic gaze on nature and its existence not as formal and material magnitude, but as spirit and magic (Nuno Crespo). Solo curated by Delfim Sardo

https://www.elisastrinna.com/

Blind Sun (Sol Cego)

Datum:
Locatie: Lisbon
In samenwerking met: Fidelidade Arte, Culturgest

The starting point of investigation of the exhibition Blind Sun are networks of subaquatic cables that cross the ocean and transmit information. The infrastructures that today host and connect the global knowledge system are mostly thin silicon cables covered with latex, crossing the depths of our planet. They are removed from the view of consumers of digital worlds. As well as many stories that could hinder or limit their reach, but that made the cloud possible.

https://www.elisastrinna.com/blind-sun

Jan Van Eyck Academie

Datum:
Locatie: Maastricht
In samenwerking met: Jan Van Eyck Academie

One year residency at the Jan Van Eyck Academy

https://www.elisastrinna.com/hadean-stories

International Residency at Seoul Art Space Geumcheon

Datum:
Locatie: Seoul
In samenwerking met: Seoul Art Space Geumcheon
http://geumcheon.blogspot.com

Summer School Art and the Politics of Individuation

Datum:
Locatie: Berlin
In samenwerking met: SAAS FEE Summer Institute of Art, Import Projects
https://sfsia.art/2016-berlin/

Soma Summer

Datum:
Locatie: Mexico City
In samenwerking met: Soma Mexico

During SOMA Summer 2015, we focused on the idea of ​​excess and its relationship with contemporary art. It departed from the proposal of the French writer Georges Bataille, who considers excess in the form of waste or “expenditure” not as a malaise, but as an outlet of energy that needs to be spent.

https://somamexico.org/archivo/objeto?id=487&nombre=SOMA%20summer%20Program%202015

Open museum, Open city

Datum:
Locatie: Rome
In samenwerking met: MAXXI Museum

Shanghai Prize

Datum:
Locatie: Shanghai
In samenwerking met: East China Normal University, IGAV
https://www.esteri.it/mae/en/sala_stampa/archivionotizie/approfondimenti/20140303_premioshanghai.html

Modern Monsters, Taipei Biennial 2012

Datum:
Locatie: Taipei
In samenwerking met: TFAM Museum

The Taipei Biennial 2012 is curated by Anselm Franke

https://www.taipeibiennial.org/2012/

6ARTISTA: Adelita Husni-Bey /Elisa Strinna

Datum:
Locatie: Rome
In samenwerking met: Macro Museum

Final Exhibition of the residency 6ARTISTA at Pastificio Cerere, curated by Vincenzo de Bellis

6ARTISTA

Datum:
Locatie: Paris
In samenwerking met: Cité des Arts

6ARTISTA

Datum:
Locatie: Rome
In samenwerking met: Pastificio Cerere

And Yet it Moves

Datum:
Locatie: Re Rebaudengo Palace, Guarene
In samenwerking met: Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo
https://www.e-flux.com/announcements/37700/eppur-si-muove-and-yet-it-moves/

Studio at Fondazione Bevilaqua la Masa

Datum:
Locatie: Venice
In samenwerking met: Bevilaqua la Masa Foundation

Artist Studio Grant

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