Emerging from a rhizomatic understanding of dualistic concepts like life and death, good and evil, black and white, Ricardo Brey’s recent Inferno drawings reflect the artist’s nuanced views on humanity and nature. In Fern at the edge of the road (2017), an explosive red thistle plant drawn in sanguine chalk anchors the center of the composition. Its leaves and branches extend outwards towards the paper’s edges, underscoring the plant’s resilience. Gestural gouache brushstrokes and Baroque-inspired patterns center the focal point of the drawing, highlighting the growth of the thistle––essentially a weed that grows on the side of the road. Spawning roots and surviving despite circumstantial distress, the thistle plant is a recurring motif in Brey’s practice, indicative of the artist’s own struggles and trajectory from Cuba to Belgium.