When María Fernanda Camarena and Gabriel Rosas Alemán aren’t in their Mexico City studio, you might find them pulling weeds or chopping vegetables. “We love cooking and gardening—practices rooted in care, and ones we’d love to weave into our work someday,” they say. “There’s a quiet mindfulness in both that aligns perfectly with what we aim to express.”
This desire to care roots much of the artists’ practice, which they present together under the name . Thinking of themselves as hosts, Celeste transforms galleries and museums with large-scale textile installations. In warm shades of pinks, oranges, and reds, the translucent cotton often allows light to filter through and cast tinted shadows around the space. Each work becomes a sort of mise-en-scène as viewers are invited to lounge with friends, enjoy a meal, or perform among the textiles.
The earthy color palette—originally inspired by natural dyeing materials like avocado pit and turmeric root—began after the onset of COVID-19, when the artists wanted to create “an atmosphere that felt like an embrace, a much-needed warmth after the isolation of 2020,” they say. “This concept of solace stayed with us, and today, the palette has come to symbolize safe spaces, with the womb as a recurring motif: a protected, intimate interior.”
Projects include “Contra el miedo y la oscuridad, la fiesta colorida y feliz,” or “Against fear and darkness, the colorful and happy party,” made in collaboration with a 4th-grade class from Mexico City’s Granada neighborhood. After adding their own drawings to the cotton panels, the students used the vivid installation as the backdrop for a school festival.
The monumental “Melons Covered in Willow Leaves” is even more immersive, as viewers were invited to wander underneath a tent of draped fabric. And in their most recent exhibition at in San Francisco, the artists have installed a trio of suspended works that bisect the gallery, with arched openings that allow visitors to pass through. Referencing Diego Rivera’s “” mural, the triad explores the connections between water and the impact of Mexico City’s colonial history on its landscape.
Later this month at in Toronto, the pair will also present “Casting a Net, Casting a Spell,” a quilted canopy of 100 individual panels created as both a suncatcher and a necessary repreieve from the summer rays. It’s their largest project to date.
With each work, Celeste hopes to “invite the spectator not only in the sense of contemplation but rather in the involvement with the ceremonial… In this setting, the sensorial and emotional realms are recognized as legitimate sources of knowledge and an experience of hospitality and acknowledgment can take place without restrictions.”
Celeste’s Hacer brotar / To sprout is on view through June 14 in San Francisco. Explore much more of the duo’s practice and process on and .
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