RedSkyFalls by Alexadre Estrela | May 9 - November 21, 2026

RedSkyFalls is a multi-part installation by Lisbon-based artist, Alexandre Estrela, for the Portugal Pavilion at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. The work on view in Venice comprises multiple video projections that are reactive to seismic activity, from tremors to earthquakes. Every time seismic activity is registered in locations around the world, 24 hours a day, the tectonic movements are made visually and aurally manifest. A loud sound erupts and the movements within the projections temporarily freeze, mimicking the ways in which organisms become perfectly still during seismic shifts. RedSkyFalls is meant to be an “amplifier of empathy,” drawing our attention to even the smallest seismic movements happening around the world rather than simply large-scale earthquakes. Thus, the jittery movements and amplified noises remind us that the plates just below us are always in constant motion, impacting the lives of all living things on Earth.

In partnership with the project at the Venice Biennale, institutions in seismically active sites around the world will display one of the Réplicas (larva) — an aluminum plate containing an image of an artificial creature engraved into its surface — from RedSkyFalls. The Wattis Institute is one of these collaborators, along with MALI in Lima, Peru; MUAC/UNAM in Mexico City; REDCAT in Los Angeles; and Galeria Zé dos Bois in Lisbon, Portugal. Seismic activity affects the behaviors of the animated beings depicted on each of the aluminum plates. When a seismic event occurs, they react like other living things, and become completely still.

RedSkyFalls is curated by Ana Baliza and Ricardo Nicolau for the Portugal Pavilion at Fondaco Marcello for the 61st Venice Biennale. The presentation at the Wattis is organized by Daisy Nam, director and chief curator and MacKenzie Stevens, deputy director.

Caguiat Delacruz: The Tramp | June 10 - November 21, 2026 

Caguiat Delacruz (Justin Caguiat and Rafael Delacruz) collaborate on an exhibition at the Wattis Institute titled The Tramp, bringing together newly commissioned film, installation, painting, and prints. At the heart of the exhibition is Caguiat Delacruz’s film, which follows two characters Wesley (and his dog Chips) and Hiroko, as they wander the streets of Oakland and fields of Half Moon Bay dressed in baggy pants, snug jacket, and bowler hat. As a point of reference, the artists use Charlie Chaplin’s beloved character “The Tramp,” who appeared in the 1915 silent film with the same name, shot and produced by Essanay Studios in Fremont, 35 miles south of San Francisco. A mischievous vagrant living on the margins, the Tramp reappears in many of Chaplin's films and became the everyman’s hero. His playful antics helped him elude authority figures and trick the elite to survive in a modernizing society.

The artists have created an encompassing environment for their exhibition, inviting visitors to be surrounded by the inner workings of the film and its aftermath: deconstructed production sets are repurposed as exhibition furniture, while drawings, production stills, paintings, prints, and ephemera are presented alongside the film. Softening the borders between media, the exhibition space becomes small vignettes and stages. Through humor and pathos, Caguiat Delacruz underscores their kinship with Chaplin’s iconic character to reflect on the rampant demands of the art market on artists and critique the ever-changing social landscape of San Francisco, as tech companies continue to displace working-class communities.

The Tramp’s use of play is embodied in Caguiat Delacruz’s own collaborative process. This exhibition marks their third collaborative exhibition. Paintings, drawings, plates (used for making prints) are passed back and forth between the artists. Together, they find a freedom to experiment and push the boundaries of their work to the margins. The exhibition is a view into their intricate web-like world that invites the visitor to reflect on the precarity and possibility of contemporary life.

This exhibition is Caguiat Delacruz’s first institutional exhibition on the West Coast.

Caguiat Delacruz: The Tramp is curated by Daisy Nam, director and chief curator, and Diego Villalobos, former associate curator.

This exhibition is supported by Teiger Foundation, The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, San Francisco Grants for the Arts, and Bloomberg Connects; the Wattis Leadership Circle: Mary and Harold Zlot, and Katie and Matt Paige; and the Curators’ Forum. Phyllis C. Wattis was the generous founding patron.

Images:

Caguiat Delacruz, The Tramp, 2026, production still.