Peruvian Artists Explore Modernity and Extraction in Harvard Exhibition

The exhibition 'Signal and Strata' was presented at Harvard University's Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts from February 5 to April 5, 2026. Curated by Madeline Murphy Turner, the show featured works by three Peruvian artists: Elena Damiani, Ximena Garrido-Lecca, and Ishmael Randall-Weeks. Their multidisciplinary practices examine how modernity intersects with resource extraction, particularly in Peru's context as a major mining nation. Damiani's sculptures use travertine and copper to reveal geological time and challenge linear narratives of progress, referencing modernist architecture like Mies van der Rohe's Barcelona Pavilion. Garrido-Lecca combines copper circuit boards with indigenous ritual materials like copal resin and coca leaves, questioning Western definitions of technology and highlighting pre-colonial knowledge systems. Randall-Weeks employs concrete and school supplies to reflect on Peru's unfinished modernization projects and educational reforms under the 1968-1980 military government. The exhibition positions these material investigations within broader discussions about climate change, extractive economies, and non-linear temporalities. Scholars cited include Giovanni Aloi, Jens Andermann, and Maristella Svampa, who provide context on human-nature relationships and neo-extractivism. The artists' works collectively propose a stratified understanding of history that complicates modernist metanarratives.