This Fall, browngrotta arts will present Continental Drift: Encounters, North and South (October 17 – 25, 2026), an exhibition that will bring together more than 40 leading fiber and sculptural artists from North, Latin, and South America and a group of international artists shaped by encounters with the region. One of the artists we will feature in Continental Drift is Trine Ellitsgaard whose work melds the cultures of Denmark where she was born and that of Oaxaca, Mexico where she has lived since 1990.
“The ordered geometric designs, the muted colors, the soothing balance of forms and textures all seem to express a Scandinavian sensibility in direct contrast to a life spent in Mexico or to traditional Mexican weaving. But the influence is undeniably there,…Trine’s work takes hold of all that she has observed in Mexico, but the Scandinavian in her reconstitutes it into new patterns; out of the meeting of these two cultures emerges a new way of seeing both,” wrote Michael Sledge (“A Latin American Master Who Happens to be Danish,” Latin American Masters, 2010).
One of the primary ways in which the influence of Mexico appears in Ellitsgaard’s work is in her choice of materials. In one work, she melds black rubber into a woven white background of plastic and silk. In Silver Cross, which we’ll include in Continental Drift, she’s used half a dozen materials including, rayon, glass thread, and silver. In Chamila, she’s used wool from a Chamula, a traditional Mexican skirtscreated on a backstrap loom. Other materials with which Ellitsgaard works are gold thread, and nylon, paper and palm, sisal and seeds—as Sledge says, “…the organic is paired with inorganic, luxurious with pedestrian, rough with smooth, shiny with sensual.”
Agave and espadin regularly appear in Ellitsgaard’s work. We were previously familiar with Ellitsgaard’s affinity for agave as an artistic element through American artist James Bassler. We exhibited Bassler’s piece, Things Past, made of agave fibers, inCrowd sourcing the Collective in 2022. The production of mezcal in Mexico has created excessive agave waste, he explained, but the material has other uses. Ellitsgaard worked with artisans in Oaxaca and the US to create fibers from agave, spin them to create rugs, bags, and artworks. With another friend, artist Kiff Slemmons, Ellitsgaard organized Agave! at the Epiphany Center in Chicago in 2021 which included prints and sculptures, carpets, furniture, apparel, and tapestries like Things Past. “The artists featured in Agave! responded to this environmental crisis by transforming these discarded leaves into fantastic pieces of design,” said Epiphany’s Director of Art & Programming Aaron Baker. “They are participating in a virtuous cycle of turning a problem into an opportunity, of turning waste into beautiful, timeless objects.”
We are excited to present Ellitsgaard’s unique artistic perspective in Continental Drift. The exhibition will also include work by Kate Hunt, who relocated to Mexico some years ago and now spends time between there and Montana. Hunt continues work on her series of flags made of newspaper — now, some of which now include San Miguel de Allende’s’s bilingual newspaper, Atencion, which includes both English and Spanish words.
See you in October!