Rosana Escobar is a textile artist who explores new ways of re-signifying and understanding our relationship with materials, reclaiming their autonomy and agency in local and global contexts. Her practice is nourished by fieldwork with farming and artisan communities in Colombia, Mexico and the Netherlands, by the scientific study of fibers, and a constant dialogue with the material through craft and industry. 

The result is a contemporary body of work with a strong identity-driven language, evident in her choice of materials and techniques to create tapestries, sculptural works, and other collectible art and design objects. Her practice, developed between Colombia and Europe, weaves connections between worlds that are often thought of as separate: craft and the global market, material tradition and technology, local production and industry. From this intersection, Escobar proposes a language in which multiple forms of knowledge and production converge.

With a background in Biology from Universidad de Los Andes (Colombia) and in Design from the Design Academy Eindhoven (Netherlands), over the past four years she has focused her research on fique fiber, an endemic Colombian plant historically used to make coffee sacks. Her approach begins with the deconstruction of the sack to return to its origin, when the fiber is still vegetable. From there, she traces its transformations, linking the material to rural landscapes, artisanal techniques, material culture, and the histories of local communities.