Lucas Rubly (b. 1991, Brasil) creates intimately scaled, muted paintings that trace the gradual disintegration of ecologies and structures within Brazil. His subjects, which include collapsing colonial architecture, abstracted buildings, soft landscapes, and crumbling sand castles, reflect the erasure of collective memories, native cultures, and land. Rubly follows in the footsteps of Brazilian modernists such as Alfredo Volpi for inhabiting the space between the figurative and the abstract, as well as his mentor Paulo Pasta for the metaphysical presence and sensitivity to tone and light in his paintings. Rubly frames his practice through the lens of existentialist thought—especially in regards to Albert Camus’ reflections on the necessity for meaning in the face of inevitable extinction. His paintings emerge from the gaps and failures of recollection, transforming half-remembered places such as childhood sandcastles and circus tents into fragile monuments against forgetting. These scenes, rendered in delicate brushwork and subdued palettes, evoke a sense of melancholy and impermanence.