take this waltz
Take This Waltz
Solo Exhibition
Faena Art Project Room
3420 Collins Ave
Miami Beach, FL 33140
On view January 20th - February 24th, 2023
In "Take This Waltz", Christina Pettersson awakens the lost native landscape of a Miami Beach that once was — mangroves, saw palmettos, and a menagerie of creatures who once roamed the city now march through her installation in a gothic carnivalesque masquerade. This ‘end of days’ waltzing funeral procession envelops the space and pays homage to the underworld in an exploration of a crucial and unique historical environment.
By posing the question How do we hear the dead? Pettersson reminds us that what we have lost will not be returned to us, it will always be lost. As the ancient world disappears, our craving to commune with it grows, and in this exhibition the artist invites us to dance into the underworld with her.
...“So blow your trumpets, carry your torches and lanterns, and dive into the dying of the light. Dance with the bears, the wildcats, the mangroves and saw palmetto thickets. Be a messenger of plants. Risk exuberance. Remember our wild ancestry by this one and only briny sea, and do not be forlorn. It is Death, not art, that imitates life. And when it is dark enough you can see the stars.”
Christina Pettersson thanks filmmaker Pedro Wazzan for his collaboration on this project and all participants who helped to create the characters that bring Take This Waltz to life.
Recorded at the Faena Hotel Theater and premiered at the Faena Art Project Room, Miami Beach, Florida.
Promotional Video - Vimeo
Exhibition Video - Vimeo
Faena Art Project Room
Photos courtesy of Pedro Wazzan.
