Hugo França and Thiago Rocha Pitta Present Collaborative Exhibition in Aspen

A first-time collaboration between artist Thiago Rocha Pitta and designer Hugo França is on view at the Marianne Boesky Gallery in Aspen, Colorado. Titled Tropical Molecule, the exhibition emphasizes the natural environment by uniting Rocha Pitta's multidisciplinary works with França's sculptural furniture. França's pieces are crafted from fallen or discarded pequi tree trunks, maintaining their natural forms including roots and branches. For França, the exhibition's theme represents birth, connection, and the beginning of nature's trajectory. He notes that his works and Rocha Pitta's are connected by photosynthesis, describing it as the origin for both, with distinct secondary effects. The cyanobacteria visible in Rocha Pitta's watercolors are the same organisms responsible for the physico-chemical processes that form wood, França's raw material, hence the exhibition's title. Rocha Pitta agrees that photosynthesis ties their works together, explaining that the cyanobacteria he has incorporated into his portfolio in recent years perform photosynthesis, just as the wood França works with needed it to form as material. The exhibition includes Rocha Pitta's 2018 sculpture Youth, created for his studio garden, strengthening the dialogue between the two. The show is open for visitation until March 31.