Practice — Chaveli Sifre

Chaveli Sifre (b. 1987, Würzburg, Germany) is an artist based in Berlin. Her multidisciplinary practice explores healing traditions, the hierarchy of the senses, botany, and the belief systems that shape them. Through installations, sculptures, paintings, and participatory performances, Sifre investigates the intersections of science, spirituality, ritual and healing modalities aiming to recover their long-lost connections.

Through her immersive and sensorial installations, Sifre invites audiences to reconsider the hierarchy of the senses in order to generate a world transforming tool.

Sifre's work has been exhibited internationally in significant venues and group exhibitions, including TBA21’s "Meandering" in Córdoba; the Julia Stoschek Foundation in Berlin; Martin Gropius Bau and Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin; Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA); the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo and Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan; Natur Nach Humboldt at Botanisches Garten, Berlin; Welt Bilder at Salon Sophie Charlotte, Berlin; We Didn’t Ask Permission, We Just Did It at Mishkin Gallery, New York; An Uncertain State at Centre Clark, Montreal; and Seen but Unnoticed, Beautiful Soup at De Appel, Amsterdam. She has also participated in major events such as the "Flow States, La Trienal 2024” at El Museo del Barrio in New York City, La Trienal Poligráfica in San Juan and the Bienal Tropical del Caribe.

Her solo exhibitions include "Essenz des Lebens (Death is a Seed)" at Kultur Büro Elisabeth, Berlin (2024); "Nothing is Finished but Everything has Begun" at 721, San Juan (2024); "Reverse Alchemy" at LISTE Art Fair, Basel (2023); and "Soft Portals" at Embajada, San Juan (2023). Other notable projects include "Aerosol - La Escuela del Olor" at Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, San Juan (2022); and "Spirit Level” at Underneath the Arches in Naples (2024)

Sifre’s work has been discussed in publications such as NEZ Magazine (France) and Arts of the Working Class (Berlin), and featured in curated catalogs like "Meandering – Art, Ecology, and Metaphysics" (Sternberg Press). Online, her work has received critical attention in The New Yorker’s review of La Trienal, Observer’s feature El Museo del Barrio’s 2024 Triennial Expands Latinx Identity to Embrace a Global Perspective, Artsy’s 8 Must-See Shows in New York This Holiday Season.

Healer’s Mask 2019 Resin, White quartz, Honey

Aura Portraits | Lover’s Portrait, 2017 Printed silk & electric fan 130cm x 70cm In my practice, I explore different belief systems. My interest is not so much in what we believe but in the fact that we believe. This human tendency, present in every culture, has taken the shape of oracles, religion, and even think tanks; they manage our relationship to the unknown, the future, and the self. This particular piece is a homage to one of my favorite works by Cuban artist Felix Gonzalez Torres.

Coconut Bombs 2016-ongoing Dried coconuts, drinkable tinctures mixed with Puerto Rican medicinal plants, rum, and chloroform. Sealed with wax, as well as found glass closures. Variable size These sculptures examine Puerto Rico’s colonial history, turning a natural coconut into an eau de cologne flask.

La Planta, Charging Box, 2016 Glass, printed silk, my mother’s crystal collection This sculpture addresses Puerto Rico’s current electrical crisis

Beeswax Mask 2019 Beeswax, Pollen, Malagueta oil, Eucalyptus oil, Peppermint oil

Personal Attention, 2016 Printed gowns, Seated sculpture, Mother and Aunt offering a Reiki session Turning the gallery space into a temple

Human Treatment, 2017, My work approaches the contemporary subject as a mediatized entity who has lost access to sensorial, spiritual experiences. Humane Treatment | Personal Attention are a series of performances, developed as part of an investigation into alternative forms of healing, proposing art as an arena that challenges conceptions of faith and health, transforming the opportunity of an exhibition into a space existing between a clinic and a temple were different belief systems, faiths, therapeutic methods and ritualistic elements are explored.

Only Fools II, 2012 trashcan, a bouquet of discarded fresh flowers, compilation sound of pulsars or dying stars

Máscara de Conchas, 2020 Shells, Pollen, Dried seaweed powder, paper, glue

Smoke Compositions | Tabonuco and Camphor is a ritual sculpture that invites us to consider the transformative power of smoke and its role in spiritual cleansing practices. The sculpture incorporates into the incense mixture tabonuco, a resin native to Puerto Rico used by the Tainos to light torches, and camphor, a substance commonly used in Caribbean cleansing practices known as "la limpia". As the scent rises from the censer, it evokes the potent power of smoke in cleansing rituals across cultures, from the burning of sage in Native American traditions to the use of incense in Catholic and Buddhist practices. "Smoke Compositions | Tabonuco and Camphor" offers a rich exploration of the cultural, historical and symbolic dimensions of smoke and its place in the human experience. Through the use of tabonuco and camphor, the sculpture connects us to ancestral Taino practices and Caribbean cleansing practices, particularly those linked to the Ifa tradition,

Caracolito, Ancestral Animism, 2022 Caribbean Seashells, oceanic scent composition, exploring symbolic and material heritage

The word Welle means wave in German. As part of my research into alternative health practices I offered people who visited my exhibition a Reiki session. Welle is a sculpture to sit on, modular, works by itself or is activated by a Reiki session or meditation. I like to develop works that work when we approach them multi-sensorially, to be touched, to be felt, these other ways of learning are usually forbidden in exhibition spaces. Welle is in itself a playful relaxation space for the viewer, simultaneously a wave and a ripple.

Granada Caliente 2018 Wax Globes, Found Glass, essential oils against body pain

Zilia (Aura Series) 2020 Printed Silk & Electric Fan scented aura portrait and homage. I wanted the wind to replicate the waves found in Zilia Sanchez’s work and also the feeling of sleeping under a soft Caribbean abanico breeze. The oceanic scent is reminiscent of Zilia’s actions between her canvases and the sea, composed of Myrrh, Lavandin, Coconut Isolate, Calone, Cypress, and Holy Basil. It is an open smell, de mar, amplitude, and generosity.

Smoke Compositions | Untitled (Theriaca Censer) 2022 Camphor, Ammonium Gum, and onycha operculum, ceramic "Smoke Compositions" is a ritual sculpture that takes the form of a penetrable censer in the shape of a modular, vibrating, zigzagging serpent, forming an ouroboros where incense burns. The shape of the censer evokes the winding course of the Gadalquivir River, where the work was activated, and the way the smoke rises and fills the air. The work also alludes to theriac, an ancient panacea made from various ingredients, including snakeskin, which was believed to cure most ailments. "Smoke Compositions" invites us to consider the intertwined histories of smell, medicine, commerce, and belief. The sculpture is a meditation on the enduring power of smell and its role in healing practices, as well as its associations with trade and exchange. By referencing theriacology, the work also speaks to the current fascination with panaceas and the promise of a universal cure.

Smoke Compositions - a meditation on the history of the Guadalquivir, the incense trade route, and incense as heritage, both symbolic and material Incense is a ritual as old as fire. The burning of incense refers to the combustion of aromatic material, a cross-cultural tradition that accompanies the history of mankind. Its longevity and widespread use reveal the dual nature of incense as a substance with both affective and symbolic meanings. In Smoke Compositions, visitors were invited to experience a participatory intervention, exploring a curated selection of resins that would have traveled along the historic Guadalquivir River trade route. The exhibition offers a space for reflection on the cultural significance of smoke, as a cross-cultural phenomenon linking spiritual and material (health) pursuits. Embedded in these materials, we can find our history of trade and mortality. Much of the incense is obtained from tree sap, this vital liquid nourishes the plant in the same way that our blood vitalizes our body and the river vitalizes the earthly body. Both blood and sap protect and regenerate. Resin is a tree's response to a wound, a liquid that flows, coating and finally coagulating, becoming hard and shiny, like a jewel.