Elena del Rivero

The towels, which are larger than human-scale, take their initial design inspiration from the traditional French Torchon aesthetic but soon become testaments to the artist’s hand, kitchen and home as the canvases bear not only acrylic paint but also stains of wine, turmeric, rust and bleach and are subjected to hand-scrubbing in the artist’s tub. As writer and curator Cecilia Fajardo-Hill writes of del Rivero’s process in the exhibition text, “the performative act of metaphorically cleaning, while also creating and integrating chance into the process of painting, both celebrates and exorcises women’s history in the kitchen.”