Eugenia Mussa

14, August 1978 Maputo, Mozambique. I like Manet

Writing a text to accompany the exhibition of a set of works belong- ing to a particular moment in an artist's trajectory begins, as I see it, with learning, approaching, recognizing that artist's language. Perhaps thought could stand in the place of language in this instance; but I believe that an artist's thought - the way they construct the world - can be understood through their work, rather than interpretive writings or the con- textualization of their practice. This process of repérage, upon which is based the writing of a text on an artist's work, is somewhat anthropophagic: it aims at borrowing ways of seeing, sorting out and experiencing the world. Painting is a pathway for this journey of discovery/exploration of particularly obscure approach. It is an intensely sensorial field, veiled and nearly inscrutable during its execution process. This dialogue becomes more complex when the setting of this moment of execution of the painting does not coincide with the set- ting of the theme approached in it, and when the object, person or subject is not present. All this would be relatively simple to perceive if Eugénia Mussa's recent paintings were abstract (places, sensation...