Erika DeFreitas Explores Unseen Forces

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Erika De Freitas, “The Black Madonnas Of Perpetual Murmurs 1, 11, 14,” 2023, collage, gold leaf, cut on paper (photo courtesy of the artist and Christie Contemporary, Toronto)

Erika DeFreitas’ exhibition, and that break is the one that shows (to shift, a curve, to quiver) explores the unseen forces that speak to us from beyond - particularly the voices and presence of ancestors. 

At its core, the exhibition is about women making themselves heard and seen, sometimes through gestures and overt actions, but more often in subversive ways and through unexpected mediums, such as the act of care for a statue of the Black Madonna, the teeth of a medieval manuscript illuminator, or layered onto the pages of a Spiritualist text.

The show is on view at the Esker Foundation in Calgary until April 27, 2025.

(DeFreitas has a second exhibition, it’s because of the shimmer, the verge, and the yet, on view in Alberta at the Hess Gallery, University of Lethbridge, until March 29, 2025.)

DeFreitas’ interest in Spiritualism, a belief system based on communing with spirits of the dead, is both artistic and deeply personal. She has a longstanding interest in historical Spiritualism, séances, aura photography, and other paranormal phenomena, practices that she incorporates into her work. This interplay between personal and historical narratives is particularly evident in her illumination of a chapter of a Spiritualist manuscript entitled Cautions, which ironically warns the living against communing with the dead. Disregarding these warnings, DeFreitas inserts herself into the manuscript, alongside images of historical female psychic mediums — women who were often criminalized and institutionalized for hysteria. In an act of historical reclamation, she renders these women with dignity and care, honouring their presence and their stories.

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Erika DeFreitas, “she returns in the midst of echoes,” 2018 (photo courtesy of the artist and Christie Contemporary, Toronto)

This same impulse to question received histories is evident in DeFreitas’ deconstruction of a work by French artist Frédéric Bazille, Black Woman with Peonies, and her collages of the Black Madonna statue of La Divina Pastora Church in Siparia, Trinidad. In the former, she uses paper cut-outs to draw attention to the absences in the historical canon, and in the latter, she layers new meanings onto a historical form. DeFreitas envisions the Black Madonna as a gilded and haloed figure draped in colourful fabrics and textures, overlaying found images of contemporary Black women — imagining them encased in cut-outs that reference stained-glass windows that should be rightfully revered.

The Black Madonna, a type of Marian statue or painting of medieval origin, is often venerated for its miraculous qualities, serving as a devotional aid for the faithful. However, DeFreitas subverts this traditional meaning. Rather than venerating the icon as a conduit to Mary, DeFreitas experiences the Black Madonna as a means of connecting with her own ancestors, particularly her paternal grandmother who was a caretaker for the statue. She emphasizes the lived experiences of those who care for the statue, reframing the figure as a site of personal and ancestral memory. This connection to her ancestors often manifests in gut feelings, or intuition, which DeFreitas channels into the gestures that make up her work. 

Some interpretations suggest that the Black Madonna represents an ancient earth goddess absorbed into Christianity, an incarnation of the world through Mary — an idea that seems to align with DeFreitas’ interest in spiritual hybridity. 

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Erika DeFreitas, installation view, “and that break is the one that shows (to shift, a curve, to quiver),” 2025 (photo by Blaine Campbell, courtesy of Esker Foundation Gallery)

This specific Black Madonna exemplifies the notion of hybridity being worshipped by both Catholics and Hindus and serving as a symbol of interfaith respect and cooperation. For Catholics, she is known as La Divina Pastora, the Divine Shepherdess, and for Hindus, she is called Sipari Mai, the Mother of Siparia, or simply Mother. The statue is associated with miraculous healings and other supernatural occurrences, paralleling DeFreitas’ own engagement with Spiritualism and the paranormal.

DeFreitas's exploration of Spiritualism reflects a contemporary understanding of spiritual practice, in which the deconstruction of past belief systems can lead to the creation of new ways of knowing, and where historical absences speak as strongly as presence. Her work embodies this idea, illuminating forgotten voices and reimagining spiritual legacies through a deeply personal and radical lens. ■

Erika DeFreitas’ exhibition, and that break is the one that shows (to shift, a curve, to quiver), is on view at the Esker Foundation in Calgary until April 27, 2025.

Erika DeFreitas, it’s because of the shimmer, the verge, and the yet, is on view at the Hess Gallery, University of Lethbridge, until March 29, 2025.

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