Curators Observatory. Gabriella Rebello Kolandra and the South as a Critical Category

Gabriella Rebello Kolandra, a curator born in Brazil in 1993 and active in Milan, develops her practice from a condition of displacement that is both biographical and structural. Her work, which intersects architecture, visual arts, and curating, questions disciplinary boundaries and language as a field of tension. She has created projects such as the exhibition program at Platea in Lodi and "Santa do pau oco," which won the Premio Meridiana at the Museo Madre in Naples. In an interview, she discusses how her personal experience of migration informs her curatorial approach, emphasizing process, material conditions, and relationships around the artwork.

This matters because Kolandra expands the concept of the "South" beyond geography into a critical category that connects the Mediterranean and Latin America, colonial legacies, and contemporary artistic practices. Her approach rejects market-driven legitimation in favor of supporting emerging practices and research in zones of friction and instability, offering a model for curating as a situated, relational, and deeply political practice.