HELENA OSPINA
LIZARRALDE

Perdiendo el tiempo is a two-dimensional installation of dry leaves hand-sewn together using cotton thread. The work is divided into six pieces, as a whole  it reflects on memory and nature as an art material, posing a question of art’s utility for remembrance. The work prompts a reflection on time: when we use our time trying to relive the past, are we wasting the present time that we will require to rebuild again?

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Perdiendo el tiempo arises from Ospina Lizarralde’s interest in understanding and recovering what is no longer here nor there. Born out of a personal practice of reflection, the artist collected dead leaves from trees that she found on the floor and hand-sewed them together, one leaf with another; the whole work of united leaves alludes to what is absent.

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With this process, she tried to rescue a forgotten element of nature. The gesture of recovering each leaf seeks to recall what is apparently dead; however, each stitch somehow revives what has not gone away in the mind. Things are not only present in their physical form; dormant memories wait to be awakened. Do we lose our present by remembering the time that has passed? Or what is "wasting time" really about? Is it really possible to “waste time”?