UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS

Purchase a ticket to our Fall Fundraiser to attend the opening of Terra Indigesta

Guttenberg arts is located at

6903 Jackson St. Guttenberg NJ

 (Guttenberg, NJ) – Guttenberg Arts is proud to present Terra Indigesta, a solo exhibition by Talita do Nascimento Cabral. The exhibition will be on view from Saturday, September 12, 2026, through Sunday, October 11, 2026. Join us for the opening reception on Saturday, September 12, from 6 PM to 10 PM, held in conjunction with Garden Thing, Guttenberg Arts’ annual fundraiser and cocktail party.

In Terra Indigesta, nothing is discarded without first being heard. Talita do Nascimento Cabral works with textiles, natural pigments, scraps of thread, found objects, plastic, insects, seeds, and plants from a garden that no longer exists. Each material carries traces of a former life and is invited to take on new meaning through paintings, garments, sculptural forms, and participatory installations.

The exhibition asks what truly happens when something is thrown away. Does it disappear, or does it continue to exist within landfills, treatment plants, waterways, and the body of the Earth? Cabral describes these sites of accumulation as Terra Indigesta—an indigestible earth that cannot fully absorb or expel the waste placed upon it. Her work questions whether plastic infiltrates the natural world, whether humans can coexist with it, and whether less toxic alternatives might be created.

A desire to return materials to the earth has led Cabral to experiment with bioplastics and natural substrates such as cassava, guar gum, gelatin, and other organic materials. Through this process, natural and human-made matter collide, merge, and transform. Rather than treating reuse solely as an environmental gesture, Cabral approaches it as a spiritual and material practice rooted in listening, care, experimentation, and reverence for the Earth.

Terra Indigesta also functions as a ritual of mourning. The exhibition honors natural environments and non-human beings that disappear as patterns of consumption, disposal, and accumulation continue. It serves as a memorial to a garden Cabral cultivated for nine years before it was destroyed for being considered “too wild,” and to all that is lost when nature is expected to remain contained within human-made boundaries.

Rather than holding this grief in isolation, Cabral invites visitors to transform it collectively. Audiences are encouraged not only to observe the work, but also to wear, touch, and carry elements of the exhibition, becoming participants in a shared ritual. Through this physical engagement, the exhibition proposes that healing and renewal are communal acts and that a new beginning—for the Earth and for ourselves—can only be reached together.

Talita do Nascimento Cabral is a Brazilian multidisciplinary artist and educator based in Jersey City, New Jersey. Her work explores the connections between Earth, spirituality, memory, womanhood, and material transformation. She is the founder of the Upcycle Coalition and has led workshops centered on natural dyeing, mending, and creative reuse. Cabral was a 2025 artist-in-residence at Guttenberg Arts and an alumna of the New York Foundation for the Arts Immigrant Artist Mentorship Program. Her work has been exhibited at New York Live Arts, the Ford Foundation Gallery, BronxArtSpace, Deep Space Gallery, and SMUSH Gallery.

For additional information or to schedule an appointment, please visit guttenbergarts.org or call (201) 868-8585. Guttenberg Arts programming is made possible in part by a grant from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a division of the Department of State, and administered by the Hudson County Office of Cultural & Heritage Affairs, Craig Guy, Hudson County Executive & the Hudson County Board of County Commissioners. Guttenberg Arts programming is also generously supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation.

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