Nele azevedo
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“To remind ourselves that we all die. Each drip of water echoes the rapid disappearance of life as we know it. Below, bowls and pots amplify the sound of their melting – a tiny, watery orchestra.
“The sound is very important,” Azevedo explains in her conversation with thisiscollosal.com. It’s not just the ice that’s going away; it’s our chance to act.
The artist Nele Azevedo.
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What do you think about this ice sculptures?
We need to rethink our place on this planet – not as rulers, but as participants in its delicate balance.”
As the world grapples with the intensifying climate crisis, Azevedo’s melting figures have taken on a deeper, more urgent resonance. As the day got warmer and the sun shone brighter, the sculptures began to melt.
She has also worked for Life Positive, a body-mind-spirit magazine and is deeply interested in wellness, mental health, holistic well-being, and spirituality.
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Ephemerality has always been at the center of Néle Azevedo’s practice. “This is to remind us of our mortality,” she says softly.
Perched on steps and plazas, the figures melt into small puddles within minutes, drawing crowds that witness their quiet demise.
“It started as a critique of traditional monuments,” says Azevedo to thisiscollosal.com. We are nature.
A successor to “Minimum Monument,” Azevedo’s “Suspended State” (shown below) similarly gathers more than 1,000 ice figures and dangles them over pots, bowls, and other kitchenware equipped with microphones.
Her art is a mirror, reflecting not only the impermanence of human existence but also the precarious state of the planet.
“This urgency requires a paradigm shift,” she says. In her studio, ice figures dangle from the ceiling, spinning lazily as the sunlight kisses them. The Brazilian artist is known globally for “Minimum Monument,” a collection of small ice figures that melt in situ.
First exhibited in São Paulo in 2005, the installation, which Azevedo dubs an “urban art action,” has found its way to cities like Paris, Belfast, Lima, and Porto.
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Poetry in ice
In her latest project, ‘Suspended State’, Azevedo takes her exploration of fragility to a new level. In each iteration, the artist carves hundreds of 20-centimeter-tall figures seated with their ankles crossed and places them atop outdoor steps and in public spaces.
“Very fragile,” she observes as one shatters in her hand.
Melting ice leads to rising sea levels and extreme weather, making it clear that we need to act fast.
As the ice figures melted, people watching the display started thinking about how fragile life is and how important it is to protect the environment. “We are not kings of nature,” she asserts. This showed how global warming is affecting our planet.
The event, organized with WWF Germany, focused on how the Arctic’s ice is melting faster than ever because of rising temperatures.