Sofía Sinibaldi transforms her daily amblings through New York City into sidewalk poetry, producing layered, two-dimensional compositions that are dense, impressionistic, and painterly. Using a digital camera and handheld flatbed scanner, which she applies directly to surfaces and objects, she captures stray branches, ornate security grilles, glass bongs in the window of a head shop, and other urban motifs. She then prints these fragments onto tissue and manipulates them by hand, forming new images as the material breaks down. Working intuitively, she reverses, repeats, or foregrounds pictorial elements to achieve a certain tone and effect.
For this commission, Sinibaldi turns to the intimate textures of interior space: a shared tabletop in the wake of a meal. Her installation draws inspiration from early-20th-century photographers in MoMA’s collection such as Josef Sudek and Man Ray, whose play with luminosity and shadow render ordinary implements—cutlery, stemware, linens—unfamiliar. Monumental in scale, The Long Conversation abstracts and spatializes the wine stain and the orange peel into shorthand for conviviality and connection.
Organized by Kari Rittenbach, Assistant Curator, MoMA PS1.