The Raul de Lara Host exhibition explores cultural narratives through timber design, using reclaimed wood as a vessel for memory and identity. Panels are carved, inscribed, and layered to document histories of migration, heritage, and place, with surfaces marked by text, grain, and pattern. Instead of treating timber as a neutral material, de Lara elevates it into an active storyteller that speaks to both personal and collective experience. Visitors are invited to engage with each detail, tracing lines that evoke time and presence.

The installation unfolds across interconnected chambers where light and shadow shape perception. Walls carry inscriptions in multiple languages, alongside carved maps and symbols that reflect cultural exchange. The sequence of spaces creates a walkable archive in which material, memory, and identity converge. By presenting wood as both structure and story, Host highlights how design can carry histories forward while grounding them in physical form.

Image Credit: Raul de Lara