Mariana Rocha | Espaço Profundo

Mariana Rocha (b. 1988) is a visual artist and teacher. She has a degree in Visual Arts from the State University of Rio de Janeiro (2013) and a Master degree in Visual Arts from the same institution (2021). Her artwork addresses issues related to the body, memory and the feminine, in pieces that lie at the intersections between drawing and painting, performance and photography. In her research, she investigates the existence of a sea within her own body, understanding both as comparable universes in their compositions and abyssal depths, as well as weaving relationships with marine fauna, especially with animals classified as molluscs.

In 2026, the artist participates in the 16th Gwangju Biennale, You Must Change Your Life, in Gwangju, South Korea. She was also selected for the artist residency at El Espacio 23, in partnership with The 55 Project, in Miami, USA. She also presents the solo exhibition “Espaço Profundo” (Deep Space) at A Gentil Carioca, São Paulo, Brazil.

In 2025, Mariana Rocha presented “Pele Inquieta” at the Centro Cultural São Paulo (CCSP), as part of the 34th Exhibition Program, in São Paulo, Brazil. She also took part in the group exhibitions “Concordar em discordar” at A Gentil Carioca, São Paulo, Brazil; “Tromba d’água,” featuring works by 13 Latin American women artists at the Museu do Amanhã, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; and “Pequenas Pinturas III” at Auroras, São Paulo. She also held her first solo exhibition, “Desde Sempre o Mar,” at A Gentil Carioca, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Her work is part of the collections of the Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo (Brazil) and the Instituto Inhotim (Brazil).

A Gentil Carioca is pleased to present Espaço Profundo (Deep Space), Mariana Rocha’s new solo exhibition at its São Paulo gallery. The text accompanying the exhibition is written by André Pitol — adjunct curator of the 36th São Paulo Biennial, professor, curator, and researcher. In this exhibition, Rocha presents a body of paintings that expands her investigation into bodies of water, bringing together the corporeal and the cosmic dimensions. In her works, movements, tides, and invisible forces reveal connections between interior and exterior, matter and the universe.

In Espaço Profundo (Deep Space), the artist explores painting as a field of transformation, where gesture, color, and line articulate themselves between control and intuition. “The body as a mobile space is present in Mariana Rocha’s painting, which transforms the equivalences between the body’s internal and external spaces into movements of the tides,” writes André Pitol.