AMALIA GALDONA BROCHE

ByMaria Rosaria Roseo

*Featured photo: Flowers for the Saints (installation view), knotted textile strips, tinsel, jute and yarn, 2021, copyright Amalia Galdona Broche

Italiano (Italian)

Amalia Galdona Broche is an American artist originally from Santa Clara, Cuba. She holds a BFA and a BA in Sculpture and Art History from Jacksonville University in Florida. Currently, She lives in Lexington, Kentucky, where she is pursuing an MFA in Visual Studies at the University of Kentucky.

A prayer and a fabric I and II (installation view), tinsel, jute, beads and yarn, 2021, copyright Amalia Galdona Broche

Through textiles, Galdona Broche’s works explore the intricate and complex themes of identity construction, preservation of memory, immigration and transculturation processes, autobiographical contents that involve the artist as a young woman of Cuban origin touched by displacement to the United States, forced to separate herself from a reality, a history and a known culture, to integrate into a new context, with a different way of existing, interacting and thinking.

The Knots We Leave Behind, natural fibers on wire amateur, 2020, copyright Amalia Galdona Broche

With her work, the artist thus investigates her identity, connecting to memories, personal and family stories, as in her most recent series, Flowers for the Saints. In addition, she aims to engage with the broader themes of collective memory, diaspora, colonialism and feminism, to create a communication that moves beyond the limits of language, time and geography.

Sisters, Our Lady of Regla, (installation view with Gestating Creatures), mixed media fibers on carved foam, 2018, copyright Amalia Galdona Broche
In Broche’s installations, the creative process becomes a tool and an integral part of the narrative. Knotting, weaving, tearing, joining, assembling and collecting are expressions of the artist’s journey through life, adapting to the experiences, places and people around her. The fabrics are applied, overlapped, accumulated, layered and hidden to build complex sculptural surfaces that waver between the abstract and the figurative. With this work, the artist entrusts the fabric with the role of a protective layer, a second skin protecting against physical, social, emotional and spiritual threats.
Mother of Horns Who Listens to Our Knots at Night, from the Companions of Concealment series, 2020, pins and fibers on carved foam, 20 x 20 x 35 inches, copyright Amalia Galdona Broche