Sol maior, 2023

Sequins, beads, various fabrics on galvanized wire and iron rebar
© Sonia Gomes

Sonia Gomes was born and raised in a small town in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, that was once known as an industrial hub for textiles. As a child, she enjoyed deconstructing and reassembling her clothes. She also used leftover fabric and found materials to make her own jewelry. After her career as a lawyer, she enrolled in the Guignard School of Art in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, at age forty-five. She went on to develop a sculptural and painting practice that involves stretching, wrapping, stuffing, and sewing multicolored fabrics into varying shapes. Sol maior is a prime example of Gomes’s experimentation with abstract, biomorphic, and coiled arrangements of various fabrics, sequins, and beads on a wire and iron support.