The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. The artist has placed the box on a platform with various marble-like pieces positoned inside the box; the lid is propped on its side.
Women Beyond Borders Art Collection founded by Lorraine Serena
Untitled, 1995 Mixed media
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. The artist has placed this box on its side, the lid slid open held in place by a hand created to resemble a bookend. The box, reminiscent of a hope chest, is a powerful symbol--- resonating, archetypal symbol of woman herself. The boxes express the hopes dreams, and conception of women and their quest for freedom of expression thoughout the world. WBB honors their vitality, wisdom, sensitivity and collective power -- Lorraine Serena, Founder/Director.
Agua Para la Difunta Correa, Tierra, 1995
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. This box has been enclosed with brown material secured with a leather string, tied on top.
"Born in Buenos Aires in 1936, Gloria Priotti studied at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes Manuel Belgrano, graduating in 1959. She received the Beca Durero from the Fondo Nacional de las Artes and the German Academy for Cultural Exchange in 1975, after which she moved to Berlin, where she remained until 1983 and developed an intensive body of work in wood sculpture. She was invited by the Berlin Senate to participate in official competitions for the Applied Arts in Architecture. She exhibited in Argentina and abroad, and contributed to the renovation plans for the Technical University of Berlin in 1979. She held solo exhibitions at Galerías Lirolay, Carmen Waugh, Aldo de Sousa, Álvaro Castagnino, Atica, del Retiro and Atica, the Departamento de Artes de la Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, Art Gallery International de Buenos Aires, Gallerie Pohl in Berlin, Neue Galerie in Bochum (Germany), Kwarz Gruppe Galerie in Berlin, the Universidad Nacional de Concepción del Uruguay, and ArteBa, and participated in group exhibitions in Argentina and Germany. She received many prizes in salons in Argentina and abroad, including a competition to create a mural relief for a pedestrian tunnel in the Tempelhof district of Berlin in 1978; a prize for her bronze sculpture installed in the Berlin Sculpture Park in 1979; and a prize for her stainless steel, aluminum, and iron sculpture installed in a technical school in Berlin in 1981. She was awarded Second Prize in the Juril Clinic and Center for Art and Communication competition in 1988, and First Prize in Sculpture at the Entre Ríos Salon in 1991. Her work is associated with magical realism. Her figurative sculpture incorporates playful elements and fragments of the human figure, not always executed in the same material. Source: “Gloria Priotti.” Arte de la Argentina. Accessed February 25, 2026. https://artedelaargentina.com.ar/disciplinas/artista/escultura/gloria-priotti/."
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. The box has been painted red with a wired fixture attached on top. This box has been reconfigured in puzzle-like pieces with letters.
Ana Lizaso is a visual artist based in Buenos Aires whose work has received several distinctions, including the Third Acquisition Prize of the Salón Municipal Manuel Belgrano (1992), an Honorable Mention from the Museo de Arte Moderno (1996), the Second Prize at the Salón Nacional (1996), and a Creativity Mention from the Fondo Nacional de las Artes (1999). She was also invited to participate in the Trabucco Prize, awarded by the National Academy of Fine Arts of Argentina, in 2001, 2004, and 2007. Since the early 1990s, Lizaso has exhibited widely in group shows, salons, and sculpture programs across Argentina. She also participated in thematic and traveling exhibitions, sculpture competitions—among them the Parque de la Memoria competition—and projects organized by galleries such as Laura Haber, Ática, and Cecilia Caballero. Her participation in Palacio Alcorta led to her inclusion in the Argentine Foreign Ministry’s collection. Throughout the decade, she continued to contribute to design-focused initiatives and served as both curator and participant in sculpture programs.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In this box, the artist has draped a crocheted fabric over the lid with various vegetation in the interior.
Estela Labiano was born in Mendoza in 1955. She obtained a Licentiate and a Teaching Degree in Visual Arts at the National University of Cuyo. As an artist, she specializes in drawing, characterizing the practice as such: "with the simplest resource—a single line—I feel I can describe the earth, the sky, and ourselves." During the last Argentine military dictatorship, she went into exile in the city of Puebla, Mexico, together with her husband, the late sculptor Chalo Tulián. While there, she taught at the Institute of Visual Arts in Puebla. After returning to Argentina, she taught at the university level in San Juan and Mendoza, and has been a professor at UNCuyo since 1988. She participated in solo and group exhibitions in Mexico, Chile, the United States, Italy, and Argentina. She received numerous awards throughout her career, including first prizes at the Salón de Dibujo Joven, Mendoza (1980); Primer Certamen de Murales, Guaymallén, Mendoza (1980); V Concurso Nacional “Las Américas”, Universidad de las Américas, Puebla, Mexico (1983); Salón Bienal de Artes Plásticas (Mendoza), Drawing (1988); Salón Vendimia de Artes Plásticas (Cuyo), Drawing (1989), and IX Salón Bienal de Artes Plásticas (Mendoza) (1994).
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Eva Travels, the artist has detailed an apple on the underside of the box with EVA and ADAM written on the edges with a robust female like sturcture perched on top.
Rosemary Gerdes was born in London, UK, on April 30, 1947, later settling in Argentina, where she became a naturalized citizen. She specializes in wood sculpture and painting. Since 1973, she has exhibited her work in Argentina, Mexico, France, Italy, Slovakia, and other countries. In 2004, scholars Karina Blaiotta and Jorge Rempel posited that Gerdes is “passionate about wood as a noble, natural material, immensely rich in expressiveness and variety. Transforming it into an artistic expression is her urgent goal.” She has exhibited since 1973 in Argentina and abroad — including Mexico, France, Italy and Slovakia — and has been active in international sculpture festivals and biennials. Over the course of her career, she has received numerous honors, and her work is a part of collections around the globe, such as the Museo Rosa Galisteo (Rosario); Museum of Fine Arts (Chaco); Beato Angélico Museum (La Plata); Sívori Museum (Buenos Aires); Museum of Gabrovo (Bulgaria); Museum of Modern Art (Toluca, Mexico). Gerdes participated in public carving competitions and wood-sculpture events in Chaco; Buenos Aires Botanical Garden; Camille Claudel Festival (France); Fairbanks, Alaska (invited artist); La Bresse (France); Højer (Denmark); Banská Štiavnica (Slovakia); Sennori (Sardinia); Playground Rodovre, Copenhagen, European Capital of Culture. In the 2000s and 2010s, she taught classes at the Eduardo Sívori Museum in Buenos Aires.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. The artist has created an eye-like structure with nails and organic materials.
"Susana Dragotta is a prominent Argentine artist and designer specializing in costuming for dance and theater. Trained at the School of Arts and Design at the National University of Cuyo, she is also an educator in her fields. Throughout her career, she has received major honors, including the Grand Prize at the National Salon in Textile Art (2009) and Merit Diplomas from the Konex Awards (2002 and 2012). Since 1989, Dragotta has explored sculpture through paper weaving, creating large-scale works that represented her at the 5th Havana Biennial (1994). In 1997, she launched the series Corazón maldito, blending sculpture and costume design. The project earned recognition from experts such as Gracia Cutuli, who highlighted her work in publications of the National Academy of Fine Arts. In the 2000s, she turned to soft sculpture, using contemporary techniques and vinyl textiles to produce collapsible, portable pieces. Her work is included in major Argentinian collections such as the Museum of Modern Art of Mendoza, the Macro-Castagnino in Rosario, the MALBA collection, and the Palais de Glace. In 2010, she took part in the group exhibition Southern Identity: Contemporary Argentine Art, organized by the Smithsonian Latino Center with Argentina’s Secretariat of Culture." Source: Satsch Gallery (@satsch_gallery). "Susanna Dragotta." Instagram, October 31, 2024. https://www.instagram.com/p/DBzfZAyqmHW/.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, this box is adorned with white and silver intricately placed beading.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. This box has been separated in half with each covered in brown fabric with pink lace.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. The artist has covered her box in a rich green fabric highlighted with green beads.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. The box is covered in blue knitted weave.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, a flat pattern design of blue blue beads highlighted with white covers the box.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. This box is also painted in reds and greens with the edges outlined in black.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, the artist has used a beaded application overall; the lid has been separated in to two parts.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, the box is covered with red and green paint with the edges detailed in black.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, the artist has used black and white beads to cover her box.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, Shekeba uses a flat pattern design in reds and blacks to cover her box.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled #1, the artist has embellished her box in white beads with a red interior resembling that of a bed.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled, Farahmand uses a flat pattern design of ciruclar forms in yellows, blues and greens to cover her box.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled #1, Barekzai uses a flat pattern design of ciruclar forms in yellows, browns and black to cover her box. Indicated on the side is written 21-5-2003.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Painting, Ahmadi details camels, a winter scene with a faceless woman on the lid; written on the side is BELQIS FACLTY OF ARTS KABUL AFGHANISTAN.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled #2, the artist illustrates water in pastels with black representing trees and mountains.
The Women Beyond Borders Art Collection includes over 900 self styled wooden boxes reflecting on a specific woman's self-identity using a variety of multi-media processes. In Untitled #1, the artist uses a pastel colored seascpe and fruit with SHABNAM CLASS (1) FACULTY OF ART is written on the edge.
PUCCINELLI DESIGN STUDIO
Magnifico, Paseo Nuevo Poster, 1990
Angular depiction of a dolphin leaping over an orange tree, with the words "MAGNIFICO! The Treasures of Paseo Nuevo. Novermber 1990." Maker details at lower right: Signed by Puccinelli. Includes a mylar sheet.
Gift of the Estate of Frances Garvin and Keith Julius Puccinelli
A Prayer for Transformation, 1996
Incoming loan, Courtesy of Frank and Lorraine Serena
“Beyond destruction, jealousy, rage, hatred, separation, revenge. Toward creation, compassion, reconciliation, transformation.” – Lorraine Serena
"The making of this … box afforded me the opportunity to reflect on and celebrate the many wonderful and precious things given to me by women; artists, friends, colleagues, and strangers whom I will never meet, who share like souls… To the Ngarrindjeri* Woman who taught me how to weave, and gave me a part of her culture… To the Women who nurtured and encouraged my talents and refused to let me give up… To the communities of Women who have taken part in Women Beyond Borders… Thank you." – Diana Robson * The Ngarrindjeri are indigenous people from Southern Australia. They traditionally wove to make traps and baskets in which to gather, store, and carry their food and bury their dead. Today few Ngarrindjeri know how to weave.
Incoming loan, Courtesy of Frank and Lorraine Serrena
VON DEN STEINEN, Cordelia
Wood box, dyed sand, needles, beads, fabric, ribbon
Amazons of the Next Millenium, 1996
"As the title suggests, my box is a symbol of the Amazons, female warriors, who lived and fought together in a migratory way of life during the golden age. My box is filled with a series of women's names (two hundred) of all nationalities from antiquity to the present, printed in capital letters, in different colors on white paper tags. Each of the names brings into mind images of a woman we know, we read, we are, or we want to be. This box filled with names, which come out from all gour sides, becomes almost invisible and signifies the power, the strength, the importance, the influence and the voice we women could achieve working together, for our rights against violence and discrimination at the beginning of the next millenium." - Jenny Marketou
Clipboard, frame, framed photographs, wire, wood box, metal ornaments, ink on paper
Wood box, lens, dice, photographs, vinyl record, stamps, metal chain and key
Polina Fedorova worked with her 96-year-old grandmother to create this box.
de CARRIERI, Leonor Rigau
Constructivismo Deconstructivismo, 1995
The artist has reconfigured her box into multiple adjoining puzzle pieces.
"Leonor Rigau de Carrieri was born in San Luis, Argentina, on October 2, 1931. She graduated as a Professor of Fine Arts in 1953, at the National University of Cuyo. There, she specialized in Color Theory, also studying traditional craft with Víctor Delhez and experimenting with didactics with César Jannello. She later married the sculptor José Carrieri and spent periods in Europe on scholarship, returning several times. Her career combined teaching, research, and institutional leadership. She taught in Mendoza and at the National University of San Juan, where she was eventually named Professor Emerita. She held senior roles at the university, served as a delegate for the Argentinian National Arts Fund, and directed the Tornambé Center for Creative Visual Arts and Museum. Her body of work spans painting, serigraphy, computer art, stained glass and glasswork. Investigations into color and light became a defining aspect of her practice. She exhibited widely, with solo shows in Argentina, in San Juan, Buenos Aires, Mendoza, and San Luis, and group exhibitions in Argentina, Mexico, and Canada. Her works are held in private collections, and her murals and glass pieces appear in homes, churches, and public institutions across the Cuyo region. Painting series include: Los pájaros (Birds); Isla de Pascua (Easter Island); Los comediantes (The Comedians); Muñecas para armar (Dolls to Assemble); and Los iconostarios (The Iconostaries)."" Source: Leonor Rigau de Carrieri, San Juan al Mundo, September 10, 2023. https://www.sanjuanalmundo.com/articulo?id=330114"
"In these devastating times of deliberate, pitiless destruction of homes, history and peoples, I defiantly built an edifice of stone to celebrate the future. It is a shrine, a shelter, an obelisk for all those people and countries whose future has been brutally marred and who are denied the chance of generating personal and collective memories. For, as every stone touches another stone, so does memory--it is created by an ageless, unbreakable bond between the past, present, and future. The stones used are ancient Byzantine mosaice cubes collected from near an archaeological site in Palestine. The mortar to fix the cubes together is an old Palestinian building recipe." - Vera Tamari
Wood box, paint, poster board, string, wood, metal ornament
"In my home country, Japan, there is a legend for girls that says that their prospective husbands have their little toes tied up to them with an invisible red thread. I used to believe in this legend as well. In my opinion, it is wonderful to be able to believe in such a thing. Since we're infants, we are educated to play a role either as a woman or as man. I still remember when I used to play house-dolls with my friends and how much we enjoyed playing the mother's role, like all the mothers of every mother. It is a simple but very pleasing memory that all women have inside. However, nowadays I often feel a victim of the male order and often wonder what I can do about it. I was thinking of this as I was making this box and I felt like I was playing with dolls again because I was doing typical housework tasks such as sewing, washing, and ironing. I hope you will tender my piece during the traveling exhibition as if it were our collective memory, which men will never be able to understand. And please, wash it and iron it when needed." - Akané Asaoka
NEDELJKOVIĆ, Borislava Prodanović
Wood box, metal hinges, feathers, beads, polymer clay, straw
Wood box, paint, metal figurine, beads, lace
Wood box, metal hinge and closure, collage, fabric, filling, thread
Wood box, barkcloth, coconut fiber, sea shells, paint
Wood box, plaster, doll socks and shoes, plastic flowers
"This is a memorial to all in my country, Guatemala, who have never received a proper burial, and were not only insanely murdered by the army of their own country, but then were piled up in clandestine cemeteries, so that their loved ones could never come and be with them. And the epitaph (THE WISH) reads as follows: Oh! Please give us a tomb! a tomb for our souls, for our poor bodies, so sore and tough from that volcanic lime! We plead you, we implore you, dear God, dear people, dear brothers, little brothers and sisters, give us a tomb, a safe tomb, with shroud made of sweetness, a place to console us, a nice place, to erase the infamy, a beautiful tomb, for us!" - Veronique Simar
Wood box, wood, colored pencil, wire mesh
"My box sculpture represents my past and my hopes and dreams for the future. Now I am caught in the middle as I work in Singapore as a domestic help. It is the thought of my children back home in the Philippines (that's why their picture is here) and my dream of having my own restaurant in Manila that keeps me going." - Anunciación Y. Paras
Wood box, filling, velvet, sweing trim, crocheted pouch
"There is one thing that is so much a part of our lives... the thatched-roof cottage. No matter where we live, we conjure up images of our cottages when we get homesick. They are remnants left behind by our ancestors from a long time ago. They are features of the natural beauty of the Vietnamese countryside. Do you know that although they are made of simple, natural materials such as different types of bamboo and palm leaves, they have covered us during rainy and sunny seasons. Some of the houses are built on stilts to protect us from against floods and the attack of wild animals in the night." - Thanh Van Tran
DAVIES, Rosalind Damaris
"Where Granvail, Irish Sea Queen resided 1530-1603." - Rosalind Damaris Davies
SERRANO, Fernande Carrión
Wood box, paint, photographs, fabric, plastic dolls, metal ornament
"My work is completely visceral. Each work or piece that I create is born from an experience or event that has marked my life. For me, it holds the meaning of a ritual of celebration, offering, thankfulness, or prayer. In this sense, I believe that it is profoundly religious. It is my way of struggling with the world, to become cleansed." - Fernande Carrión Serrano
Wood box, gauze, toy parts, circuit board
Wood box, perfume bottles, make-up containers and brushes, mirror
"The title, Make Up, is chosen as it refers not only to the cosmetics we women apply on our faces, but also to other connotations--to fabricate, to supplement, to collect, to put together, to parcel, to put into shape, and to arrange-- all of which formed part of the procss in its making. Make Up looks at the notion of wholeness with reference to the obsession women to be or be seen as psychologically and physically sufficient. The mirror on the top of the box reflects the viewer's face, thus engaging/making him/her as a subject. Hence, the artwork questions a woman's need and her behavior in wanting to "fit in" through the act of supplementing her appearance with cosmetics. Is the woman's quest to Make Up her complete self destined to fail?" - Dorathy Lye
"My work deals with the femininity of a woman, as she struggles not only be a part of society's workforce, but also to maintain her appearance as changes are brought about through aging. Instead of a small wooden box, I have cast a larger box from wax, not only to enhance its appearance but also to give it that sense of being alive. The box itself is wrapped up with skin and it is this skin that is stacked inside the box in repetitive folds. The wrapped box together with the repetitive skin represents the struggles of a modern woman in the community, to which she has, to balance between society and the family, and yet maintain her endless beauty for society." - Agatha Hutton
ROSSETTI-JOHNSON, Willow