Artist’s country of origen: United States
Materials: Vintage settee (1940s), upholstered in cotton fabric hand-painted with gold acrylic paint.
Size: 99  x 180 x 68  cm / 96 x 60 x 66 cm ​
Year: 2017

In her installation Impending Beauty, artist Tatiana Arocha reconstructs a late 19th-century European tea room through elements that allude to the environmental impact that illicit economies have on tropical forests. The upholstery of the furniture is intervened by the artist with images that evoke the rainforest—plants, snakes, and other animals.

The wooden parts of the furniture, painted in gold, highlight the tension between the material value of this metal and the ecological value of an ecosystem such as the Amazon, which is of vital importance to global balance.

The installation is activated through the collective act of sharing coca tea, as an invitation to engage in dialogue about the consequences of colonial power on the territories and cultures of Indigenous and rural peoples.

For the exhibition Coca, Palabra-Mundo at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, this installation was presented alongside the work La Chagra de Amoka, which served as a backdrop and created a space of encounter where her large-scale work became the setting.