The Landsdorff Expedition. Before Your Eyes
Exhibition architecture and design
Tsaritsyno State Museum-Reserve, Moscow
450 m2
16.10.2022–15.01.2023
In 1822–1829, a Russian expedition led by the diplomat, physician, and naturalist Georg Heinrich (Grigoriy Ivanovich) von Langsdorff (1774–1852), crossed the whole country of Brazil, from Rio de Janeiro to Belém. The expedition included a diverse group of artists and scientists. They returned with samples of fauna, botanical illustrations, travel journals, descriptions of local customs and languages, and music scores of birdsongs. These materials show how arts and sciences have historically enriched each other. <…>
In her work, Aline Xavier Mineiro recognizes and even emphasizes the use of various systems of cognition, such as the intangible heritage, the human-nature relationship, the diversity and complexity of the world which cannot be reduced to absolute and discrete units. <…>
In this sense, Before Your Eyes starts from a movement opposite to the initial expedition, it is called a counterexpedition by the artist herself. 200 years after Georg von Langsdorff's journey, she explores Russian museum collections and archives in search of his findings. Through her research and curatorial work, Aline revives the spirit of discovery characteristic of expeditions and rediscovers objects that remained invisible and inaccessible for decades.
Pedro Veneroso
Author of the Project: Aline Xavier Mineiro
Project Supervisor: Nina Mochalova
Coordinator: Ekaterina Eliseeva
Photographer: Dmitriy Schelokov