THE WELL

AI-generated Video, 7:27 min, 2026

In a black-and-white chamber of stone and water, the video unfolds like a ritual remembered from a dream.

A dark-haired woman confronts a veiled female figure, the rising tension oscillates between protection and haunting. Hands and gestures become the language of this wordless video. The water in the well is both womb and grave: it receives the body, distorts identity, and pulls it back into the matter from which it came. Its depth remains unknown.

In this work, Eldagsen refers to four overlapping female archetypes connected to Portuguese spiritual history: The pagan goddess Tanit, the mysterious Moura Encantada, the veiled female Sufi saint, and the Christian Mary. They are not treated as separate religious quotations, but as overlapping carriers of protection, fertility, enchantment, and hidden knowledge. Their shared force is “baraka” (Arabic بَرَكَة): transmitted by a blessing gesture of the hand, it is a spiritual charge that moves through bodies, materials, and places.

How does Eldagsen depict these female archetypes?

Tanit is condensed into an abstract symbol carved into a monolith, like a protective mark left by an older world. Mary appears as a stone sculpture through which the water enters the well, turning the Christian figure into a conduit rather than a distant icon. Both the Sufi saint and the Moura appear as living figures. The Moura Encantada is an enchanted shapeshifter in Portuguese folklore, carrying both attraction and danger. Bound by an imposed spell, she is linked to wells, stones and unresolved memory. The veiled Sufi saint represents a figure whose power is not revealed through identity, but transmitted through gesture, touch and silence.

The work was created as a loop and refuses closure. The surface of the well reflects, the water receives, the figures appear and disappear, but the source remains hidden. “THE WELL” becomes a chamber of transmission, where pagan, Islamic, folkloric, and Christian symbols do not cancel one another out. Instead, they gather around the same dark opening, as if blessing itself were something ancient, unstable, and still descending.

“THE WELL” was created for the group exhibition “Mão de Baraka (The Hand of Baraka)”, authored and curated by Susana Rodrigues. The exhibition brings together works by ten artists from different generations and geographical locations in a reflection on symbol, memory, and spirituality.

19 June – 22 August 2026
Alfaia Gallery
Rua Brites de Almeida 18
8100-679 Loulé, Algarve, Portugal
https://www.alfaia.org