Exhibitions
The earth breathes at the MUAC with Delcy Morelos
In the heart of University City, within the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), lies the University Museum of Contemporary Art (MUAC), one of the most important spaces dedicated to contemporary art in the country. Over the years, it has established itself as a meeting point for art, reflection, and cultural criticism.
And in room 9 of the capital's venue, Delcy Morelos's exhibition, "The Womb Space ," is on display from October 18th until June 7th, 2026. The Colombian artist is today one of the most prominent figures on the international contemporary art scene. Although her career began in painting, her work has evolved toward volumetric and site-specific interventions, in which she explores space, matter, and territory. Morelos still considers herself a painter, even though her current work transcends the limits of the canvas and is part of a personal—and sometimes subversive—reinterpretation of land art and minimalism.
The project that Delcy Morelos presents at the MUAC marks the beginning of a new series of commissioned works for the museum's Gallery 9. The result of several residencies in Mexico City, Oaxaca, and Chiapas, the artist conceived an installation that completely envelops the space, transforming it into a sensory and spiritual experience.
The artist at the Hamburger Bahnhof last July.
For some time now, Morelos has been exploring the profound connections between the land, food, magic, and mythologies that permeate cultures. Along this path, his perspective on the world has shifted: his works no longer merely rest on the surface of the earth, but engage with its energy, its memory, and its very breath.
For the artist, the earth is a feminine body, a living presence that nourishes, protects, and teaches. Throughout history, human beings have created technologies and rituals to communicate with it, seeking to understand its language and maintain the delicate balance between life and the environment. With this installation, Morelos invites us to immerse ourselves in that mystery: that of an earth that not only sustains, but also speaks.
In The Belly Space, Delcy Morelos transforms the room into a circular structure that rises to almost touch the ceiling. There are no paintings or white walls: only a belly of earth that envelops the visitor and invites them into an organic, warm, and silent world. Crossing the threshold is like being absorbed by the root of something ancestral, something that has always been there, but that we learned not to see.
Inspired by pre-Hispanic forms and knowledge, Morelos proposes a gesture of introspection. Her work does not seek an escape, but a point of encounter: with the earth, with memory, with the body. The intense aroma of earth and corn permeates the air, becoming almost a language of its own. This is no coincidence: the materials come from fields in Otumba, State of Mexico, and will be returned to their origin when the exhibition concludes.
In that cycle, the earth becomes earth again. Nothing is lost, nothing is wasted. The installation thus becomes an ecological and spiritual act, an offering of respect to the soil that sustains us and of which we are inevitably a part.
"In ancestral Andean traditions, the human being is the living earth; I am a body, I am the earth. In the exhibition space, the earth expresses itself; it is the center and the mirror of what we are." -Delcy Morelos, 2023
