Artists

Sara Massa

Press release

A pause, a waiting room, an interrupted path, one, or three, (off)beats of interlude. Drawing on imagery anchored in the Azorean pasture landscape, Sara Massa explores an intimate, yet resistant relationship with island isolation, displacement, and powerlessness. Between the beat, which marks and sustains time, and the offbeat, which interrupts, destabilizes and diverts it, the collection of six videos presented in the exhibition And wait, and wait, and wait, at the Project Room • Guest Young Artist, proposes a condition that is simultaneously of waiting and of provocation. The island experience does not emerge merely as a geographical context, but as a temporal condition. Isolation and distance produce a time perception where waiting ceases to be an exception and becomes a way of inhabiting everyday life. It is within this particular rhythm that the actions proposed by Sara Massa intersect with unavoidable forces such as isolation, distance, growth, and social conventions. Between the desire to act, the limits of action, the videos reveal situations in which experience is shaped by the impossibility of fully intervening. This dimension echoes the reflections of Camus (Le mythe de Sisyphe, 1942), for whom the absurd arises from the conflict between humanity's need to attribute meaning and the indifference of the world. Similarly to Sisyphos(1), condemned to an endless task, the figures that inhabit these works prolong performative actions, shifting attention from outcome to duration. These ideas are particularly relevant in the works "Waiting for war to end", in which waiting becomes suspended observation in the face of ongoing conflict, "Proibido tocar na vaca", which addresses proximity and non-intervention, and "Do not disturb", a video in which repetition structures everyday life and where observation replaces action. Between apparently simple and prolonged movements, the works oscillate between the attempt to inhabit a center and the experience of emptiness. Departing from a traditional narrative logic, and reinforced by the absence of language, privilege is given to the experience grounded on the duration of the gesture itself. It is within this relation that the suspension of time becomes a way of observing, inhabiting, and challenging the established order. More than shared narratives or themes, these works showcase subtle forms of resistance, conformity and misalignment. Each video establishes itself as an autonomous unit, yet extends itself through dialogue with the others, permeating the exhibition space through different performative actions. Visitors are invited to pause, to sit, to lie down, and to move through this body of work at their own pace. 1 In Greek mythology, Sisyphus was condemned by Zeus to the punishment of an endless and futile task of rolling a boulder to the top of a mountain. However, each time he neared the summit, the boulder would slip from his grasp and tumble back to the foot of the mountain, compelling him to resume the eternal labour of pushing it back up. Biography Sara Massa (São Miguel, 2002) is a multidisciplinary visual artist whose practice explores the transformation of references rooted in the Azores island experience, into ambiguous and fictional narratives. Through an approach that intertwines satire and humour, the artist seeks to blur and deconstruct the boundaries between truth and fiction. In 2024, she completed a BA in Art and Multimedia at the Fine Arts University, in Lisbon, where she is currently based.