Larissa Laban creates scenes suspended in absence. Her figures—often animals—float against smooth black grounds, inhabiting an enigmatic, liminal world. Their umwelt is shaped by kitsch objects and familiar relics—trinkets, an old telephone, quiet symbols—bound together by a shared, unspoken secret.

The Portuguese word cômodo translates to both comfort and complacency, a duality that defines these characters as they adapt to solitude and find contentment within it. Laban’s palette of deep, saturated tones heightens the tension between presence and absence, generating an atmosphere of quiet mystery. Her practice moves between abstract airbrushing and oil painting, seeking balance between precision and dissolution.

Within this universe, each organism functions as an artifact of concealed meaning, prompting viewers to decipher what remains deliberately withheld. Laban’s work neither poses direct questions nor offers answers. Instead, it unsettles and displaces familiar references, inviting a different mode of perception. Her characters suggest that communal imagination precedes collective knowledge—embodying the core of umwelt: a shared yet deeply subjective experience of the world.