A Language Between the Sacred and the Animal
A transdisciplinary practice shaped by spirituality, nature and oneiric states.
Cecilia Porras Sáenz’s work is articulated through images that emerge from an intimate territory. Her practice does not begin with narrative or the illustration of an idea, but with the appearance of presences. Solitary figures, open spaces and encounters between human and animal bodies form suspended scenes, closer to states than to stories.
Elements such as water — appearing as holes, pools or floating bodies — felines, plants, fire and gentle beasts recur as signs that do not seek to be decoded, but inhabited. Within this symbolic landscape, the human and the animal coexist without hierarchy or opposition.
“My work brings together my spiritual, mental, material and creative planes. It speaks of presences, animals and deities that inhabit the mystery of the nature that surrounds me and of which I am part.”
– Cecilia porras sáenz
The images operate within a sensory logic. They do not aim to explain, but to open a space where perception comes before meaning.
Process as Ritual and Mutation
Cecilia’s practice is transdisciplinary. She moves between painting, installation, theater, photography, costume, and masks without establishing fixed boundaries between disciplines. Each medium appears as a different possibility for giving form to the same ongoing search.
Her trajectory has been shaped by decisions that implied shifts in direction: leaving a degree in communication to dedicate herself to painting, moving from visual arts to performing arts, and participating in formative processes and residencies across Latin America and Europe. Each of these moments expanded her practice and reinforced a way of working open to expansion and mutation.
Time plays a central role in her way of working. Some works require pause and distance before being revisited; others develop with greater immediacy. The completion of a piece does not follow a formula, but rests on a decision sustained by certainty.
“When a work is finished, it is a certainty and a decision.”
– Cecilia porras sáenz
Within that process, enjoyment emerges through contemplation and the bodily experience of making. Painting becomes a state in which the mind falls silent and the body follows the movement of the work. In installation and theater, the process expands into research, reading and the development of an idea from its origin to its materialization.
Dream States and New Territories
At this moment, Cecilia’s work is beginning to circulate in other contexts. Her participation in a recent publication by ACT. Editorial in Brazil, bringing together surreal and oneiric practices by Latin American artists, marks a stage of expansion and visibility.
“I believe my work generates sensations related to states such as dreaming, reverie, and experiences we define as magical.”
– cecilia porras sáenz
Being part of Art Week CDMX 2026 represents both a challenge and a rising energy. A space where multiple artists and practices converge, and where her work enters a broader conversation without losing its own rhythm.
Within this crossing of disciplines, times and sensitive states, her practice remains faithful to a way of working that allows images to emerge and be inhabited, without the need for explanation.
Follow the Artist
Cecilia Porras Sáenz
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cecilia_porras_saenz/
