Photos by Larissa Ambachtsheer
Raízes da Terra
Within À Volta do Barro (2024–), I work in dialogue with communities, tradition bearers, and experts to trace the movement of a female ceramic tradition and understand how different historical contexts have shaped its development.
Community narratives, archival material, literature, and scientific research are brought together in visual notes. These forms of knowledge complement one another, making visible how the tradition has moved, transformed, and continues to exist in different ways.
Following research with communities in Cape Verde and with the diaspora in Europe, the project now continues in São Tomé and Príncipe. The archipelago functioned as an early plantation experiment within the Atlantic world, built on monoculture and slavery, that later served as a model for plantation systems in South America.
Archaeological research by Dr. M. Dores Cruz (2024) indicates that the ceramic practice developed on the island; today, however, the tradition is no longer known as an active practice. What remains are objects, traces in the landscape, and memories concentrated around the village of Neves. There, the practice continued until relatively recently, but following the loss of the last active ceramicists, it has not been continued in a sustained way.
Since early 2025, I have been conducting research in collaboration with archaeologist and anthropologist Dores Cruz, focusing on the development of this tradition on the island and building relationships with people who remain connected to it. As in previous phases, this process has been documented through drawings and notes.