Celina Eceiza – A material called Earth, Volume 2: I will remember this body

Fall 2026 Exhibition at MSVU Art Gallery

Celina Eceiza, A material called Earth, Volume 1: The life of corners, 2026. Art Gallery of Burlington. Photo: Darren Rigo.

Celina Eceiza
A material called Earth, Volume 2: I will remember this body

Curated by Sylvie Fortin
Organized by MSVU Art Gallery
September 12 – November 14, 2026
Opening Reception: Saturday, September 12, 1 – 4pm
MSVU Art Gallery, Halifax

I will remember this body, the second volume of Celina Eceiza’s serial exhibition A material called Earth, reimagines her artistic entanglements by drawing on the unique convergence of feminist, conceptual, and craft practices that distinguishes artmaking in Halifax.

The Argentine artist’s situated installation cuts across the Brutalist features of the Mount Saint Vincent University Art Gallery (MSVU AG) with an ephemeral architecture that immerses visitors in two distinct yet related environments. Hand-dyed and embroidered textiles, a monumental wall drawing, site-specific sculptures, and selected works from the MSVU AG’s permanent collection metabolize both the tall, coffered gallery and the institution’s history. Oversize fabric books sewn onto the floor, wheatpasted drawings, and hand-drawn texts reconfigure the adjacent balconied gallery into a den-like space whose jostling material and narrative registers translate the experiences that have shaped Eceiza’s understanding of art’s purpose and potential, which is indebted to the concept of anthropophagy, or cultural cannibalism.

Volume 2: I will remember this body is the second of many loosely connected exhibitions that make up A material called Earth. Experimenting with forms that contract, detract, and disperse, this serial exhibition is a curatorial laboratory and a response to polycrisis: one ambitious exhibition whose locally anchored parts come together, one after the other, across North America over the course of three years. A material called Earth also speculates on how an exhibition moves as it travels by foregrounding its impermanence and situatedness, and the ways it channels energies, circulates resources, entangles economies, gifts experiences, and metabolizes images and ideas. It explores what an exhibition leaves behind and what it carries forward as it reconfigures, or rather, recycles itself. In this, it tests how migratory exhibition practices might enrich our artistic and social ecosystems and our imaginaries.

This project’s Canadian “volumes” are generously supported by Canada Council for the Arts. Volume 3 will be on view at the Burnaby Art Gallery, Burnaby, BC, June 24 – August 29, 2027. Volume 1: The life of corners was on view at the Art Gallery of Burlington, Burlington, ON, May 16 – August 16, 2026. Volume 4 will be announced shortly.

Celina Eceiza, A material called Earth, Volume 1: The life of corners, 2026. Art Gallery of Burlington. Photo: Darren Rigo.

About the Artist

Celina Eceiza is an artist based in Buenos Aires. Solo exhibitions of her work have been presented at FRAC Bretagne, Rennes, France (2026), Art Gallery of Burlington, Burlington, ON (2026), Halle Für Kunst Steiermark, Graz, Austria (2025) and Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires (2024). Her work has also been featured in international exhibitions including the 18th Istanbul Biennial (2025) and is held in public and private collections.

About the Curator

Sylvie Fortin is an interdependent curator, writer, and editor based between Montréal, New York and Buenos Aires and working internationally. Her recent projects include Celina Eceiza, A material called Earth, Volume 1: The life of corners, Art Gallery of Burlington, Burlington, ON (2026); Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens, An Animated Assembly, Nanaimo Art Gallery, Nanaimo, BC (2026); Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens, Convertirse en piedra (Turning to Stone), Móvil, Buenos Aires (2025), and the group exhibition Punto de fuga, Móvil, Buenos Aires (2024). She has held leadership roles at La Biennale de Montréal and ART PAPERS, and her writing has appeared in publications including Artforum, Frieze, and e-flux Criticism.

Celina Eceiza, A material called Earth, Volume 1: The life of corners (detail), 2026. Art Gallery of Burlington. Photo: Darren Rigo.

Related Programming

Crafternoons: Drawing Marathon
A drawing workshop facilitated by Celina Eceiza
Thursday, September 10, 2 – 4pm
Mount Saint Vincent University Library & Archives, 15 Lumpkin Road
Drop-in; no registration or prior drawing experience required.
Presented in collaboration with the Mount Saint Vincent University Library & Archives

Fiction as Art Writing
A reading/writing session featuring Cesar Aira, facilitated by Karin Cope and Sylvie Fortin
Friday, September 11, 2 – 3pm
All Nations Church, 2535 Robie Street
Drop in; no registration required.
Presented in collaboration with the Halifax Art Book Fair 2026

Artist and Curator Talk/Tour
With Celina Eceiza and Sylvie Fortin
Saturday, September 12, 1:30 – 2:30pm
MSVU Art Gallery

About MSVU Art Gallery

Opened in 1971, MSVU Art Gallery is dedicated to presenting contemporary art programming with an emphasis on women and gender diverse people as cultural subjects and producers. Consistent with the principle that exhibition spaces are civic spaces, the gallery is committed to normalizing accessible presentation practices throughout its public programs. Admission is always free.

MSVU Art Gallery and Mount Saint Vincent University are situated on Mi’kma’ki, the ancestral, unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq.

Acknowledgements

MSVU Art Gallery thanks the Canada Council for the Arts and the Halifax Regional Municipality for their generous support.

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Accessibility:
MSVU is partially accessible. For more information, visit the Plan Your Visit page on our website. Please feel free to reach out to art.gallery@msvu.ca with any access requests, service needs, or inquiries.