Cross-Cuts | Érica Burini

The video screening program developed by Erica Burini, the first participant of the curatorial residency program launched in 2024 by SAHA and YBYTU, during her research process in Turkey will be presented to the public on Saturday, May 24 at 5:00 pm at SAHA Studio.

Emerging from a research project focused on the operations and survival strategies of independent art spaces, this program takes shape as a curatorial gesture rooted in resistance, aiming to build a bridge between the sociopolitical and artistic contexts of Brazil and Turkey.

Emerging from a research project focused on the operations and survival strategies of independent art spaces, the program takes shape as a curatorial gesture rooted in resistance and invention, bridging the sociopolitical and artistic contexts of Brazil and Turkey.

The program title refers to a classic film editing technique — cross-cutting — in which two simultaneous actions are interwoven to establish narrative and visual connections between distinct scenes. Inspired by this principle, Cross Cuts presents five pairs of video works, each combining a contemporary Brazilian and Turkish artist. These pairings were selected based on formal, thematic, or technical affinities, and are shown in parallel to provoke frictions and resonances between geographically distant yet conceptually aligned practices.

The selection is organized around five curatorial axes:

•⁠ ⁠Landscape, rupture, and the Anthropocene – exploring representations of the natural environment and its irreversible transformations.

•⁠ Fiction, narrative, and discourse – investigating storytelling and fabulation as tools for shaping meaning and criticism.

•⁠ ⁠Childhood, play, games, and politics – addressing childhood as a space of imagination, but also of social learning and contestation.

•⁠ ⁠Contemporary mythologies, national stereotypes (internal and external) – challenging crystallized images of identity and belonging.

•⁠ Relations, performances, circuits of affect, high/low culture, and behavior patterns – offering a critical and sensitive reading of social and emotional dynamics in everyday life.