HOW CAN LANGUAGE BE FOUND IN THE BODY?
Francisco Diego & Stella Geppert
Performative encounter in the installation BETWEEN THE BODY AND BELONGING, Mexico City, 2025 (Photo: Fer Mainero)
Preview: Fri, August 21, 7 – 9 pm
Tours: Fri, August 28, 7 – 9 pm; Artist Talk: 8 pm
Art Week Opening: Sun, September 6, 3 – 7 pm
Finissage: Sat, September 12, 3 – 6 pm
Duration: August 21 – September 12
Opening Hours: Thu – Sun 3 – 7 pm
What exactly happens in the body when it learns a new language? How do these new movements feel in the body? Where, and in what gestures or textures, does each language reside? Does this embodied learning expand one’s sense of self—and if so, how does such an identity form?
The collaboration between Francisco Diego (Mexico) and Stella Geppert (Germany) stems from an exploration of identity, vulnerability, and the body as a site of transformation. Both artists address the loss of a sense of belonging and the search for it. Drawing on interpersonal dynamics, they ask: What happens in the body when it learns a new language? Does this give rise to an expanded identity? Rather than viewing language as a purely intellectual system, it is understood as something embodied, transmitted through rhythm, sound, and physical experience. As fragments of language and cultural references are learned, subtle physical shifts and forms of fusion emerge. Following an initial appropriation of languages through textures and textiles, physical interaction then opens up a space that redefines and reformulates identities.
Diego’s and Geppert’s working methods differ greatly from one another, yet both pursue a collective vision that is informed by personal experiences, which they negotiate socially with others and/or make accessible. Diego works on the basis of technical expertise. His sculptural and graphic thinking draws on the vocabulary of applied and figurative art. Geppert works in a concrete, body-oriented, and performative manner. Both, however, share a deep engagement with questions of connection to the world, belonging, and vulnerability. This is reflected in their work in different ways through their treatment of the body, which is stretched or expanded. Diego’s bronze sculptures are deformed by stress and nestle against bodies. In Geppert’s performances, participants wear body constructions that represent specific physical states.
Geppert and Diego are exploring new forms of communication and collaboration. It is an open-ended process in which roles are swapped, and identities are redefined. The goal is to create realities through action rather than strictly following a predefined plan. The framework can dissolve and reform as needed. It is a kind of “wrestling” with language — with different languages, with cultural barriers, with personal boundaries and fears—that are shaped by external circumstances and internal influences, such as family dynamics, experiences of war, as well as exclusion, uprooting, … “Questioning laughter” leads to unusual paths of artistic collaboration. Currently, they exchange digital volumes across great distances. Sculptures and molds are converted into three-dimensional files, which are then rematerialized. The focus is not on the creation of the form, but on its translation and transfer. Visible layers of print remain as traces of this shift and reveal the transition of the volume between its physical and digital states.
Francisco Diego is a Mexican artist working across sculpture, installation, printmaking, and writing. His practice investigates shifts in meaning, exploring how language, translation, and everyday objects reshape our relationship with memory, identity, and one another. His work has been presented at Museo Franz Mayer, Galería Libertad, Museo de los Conspiradores, and WhiteLab Madrid, among other art institutions.
Stella Geppert is a Berlin artist, sculptor and performer who weaves together various media (sculpture, choreography, drawing, sound). Her work focuses on embodied communication, the global impact of simple actions, energetic bodily states and transgenerational behavioural transmission. She has exhibited at venues including DANSEHALLERNE (Copenhagen), the Liu Haisu Art Museum (Shanghai), KAI 10 (Düsseldorf) and the Drawing Now Art Fair (Paris).
With kindly support of Instituto Cultural de México en Alemania, the Mexican Embassy Berlin, Degewo, Viarco – São João da Madeira, Portugal
The collaboration between Francisco Diego (Mexico) and Stella Geppert (Germany) stems from an exploration of identity, vulnerability, and the body as a site of transformation. Both artists address the loss of a sense of belonging and the search for it. Drawing on interpersonal dynamics, they ask: What happens in the body when it learns a new language? Does this give rise to an expanded identity? Rather than viewing language as a purely intellectual system, it is understood as something embodied, transmitted through rhythm, sound, and physical experience. As fragments of language and cultural references are learned, subtle physical shifts and forms of fusion emerge. Following an initial appropriation of languages through textures and textiles, physical interaction then opens up a space that redefines and reformulates identities.
Diego’s and Geppert’s working methods differ greatly from one another, yet both pursue a collective vision that is informed by personal experiences, which they negotiate socially with others and/or make accessible. Diego works on the basis of technical expertise. His sculptural and graphic thinking draws on the vocabulary of applied and figurative art. Geppert works in a concrete, body-oriented, and performative manner. Both, however, share a deep engagement with questions of connection to the world, belonging, and vulnerability. This is reflected in their work in different ways through their treatment of the body, which is stretched or expanded. Diego’s bronze sculptures are deformed by stress and nestle against bodies. In Geppert’s performances, participants wear body constructions that represent specific physical states.
Geppert and Diego are exploring new forms of communication and collaboration. It is an open-ended process in which roles are swapped, and identities are redefined. The goal is to create realities through action rather than strictly following a predefined plan. The framework can dissolve and reform as needed. It is a kind of “wrestling” with language — with different languages, with cultural barriers, with personal boundaries and fears—that are shaped by external circumstances and internal influences, such as family dynamics, experiences of war, as well as exclusion, uprooting, … “Questioning laughter” leads to unusual paths of artistic collaboration. Currently, they exchange digital volumes across great distances. Sculptures and molds are converted into three-dimensional files, which are then rematerialized. The focus is not on the creation of the form, but on its translation and transfer. Visible layers of print remain as traces of this shift and reveal the transition of the volume between its physical and digital states.
Francisco Diego is a Mexican artist working across sculpture, installation, printmaking, and writing. His practice investigates shifts in meaning, exploring how language, translation, and everyday objects reshape our relationship with memory, identity, and one another. His work has been presented at Museo Franz Mayer, Galería Libertad, Museo de los Conspiradores, and WhiteLab Madrid, among other art institutions.
Stella Geppert is a Berlin artist, sculptor and performer who weaves together various media (sculpture, choreography, drawing, sound). Her work focuses on embodied communication, the global impact of simple actions, energetic bodily states and transgenerational behavioural transmission. She has exhibited at venues including DANSEHALLERNE (Copenhagen), the Liu Haisu Art Museum (Shanghai), KAI 10 (Düsseldorf) and the Drawing Now Art Fair (Paris).
With kindly support of Instituto Cultural de México en Alemania, the Mexican Embassy Berlin, Degewo, Viarco – São João da Madeira, Portugal