Walking barefoot

At Punta della Dogana, Pinault Collection presents Algebra, a project by Brazilian artist Paulo Nazareth curated by Fernanda Brenner. Conceived as a performative, narrative environment rather than a traditional exhibition, it centers on the idea of travel as embodied knowledge. For over fifteen years, Nazareth has crossed continents linking performance, endurance and ancestral memory. Walking barefoot becomes both a ritual of respect for enslaved ancestors and a critique of colonial mapping and systemic racism. The title Algebra, from the Arabic al‑jabr (“to restore what is broken”), guides a process of reassembling fragmented histories.

Works appear as stations rather than a linear path. A key piece, Notícias de América, gathers materials from his ten‑month journey from Brazil to New York, forming an “embodied chronicle” of migration. A line of salt running through the space reveals the outline of a tumbeiro, the slave ships of the Atlantic trade, itself an elemental metaphor of preservation and pain. Algebra interrogates colonial violence and official erasures, transforming Punta della Dogana into a place where Nazareth seeks to “solve” what history has left unrecorded.