ADELAIDE.- South Australian artist Ida Sophia will present her new installation and performance work, Patience and Penitentia, at Samstag Museum of Art from 26 June to 18 September 2026.

Presented in Samstag Gallery 2 as part of the 2026 SALA Festival, Patience and Penitentia is a durational performance confronting silence and estrangement as corrosive cultural practices. It focuses on the “silent treatment”, an insidious and devastating form of punishment that perpetuates exclusion and abuse across families and communities. By turning this usually hidden tactic into a public, ritualised performance, the work invites recognition, conversation, and the possibility of breaking cycles.

Across this live ritual, Sophia will undertake a 40-day durational performance committing to a staggering 276 hours of performance over the exhibition's run.

The work uses sound, language, movement and gesture to show how silence can become a force inside a relationship. It looks at what happens when communication, affection or attention is withheld, and how that can leave a person waiting, questioning themselves and trying to repair something they may not have broken.

In preparing for this significant physical undertaking, Ida has spent the past year training her body and mind for the demands of the work. The 40-day performance requires stamina, discipline and emotional focus, with each gesture and repetition carrying the weight of the experience she is bringing into public view.

For Ida, the work has a strong connection to the experiences of women. It speaks to the pressure often placed on women to stay calm, be patient, make peace, forgive quickly and carry the emotional weight of a relationship, even when they are being hurt.

Ida said, “Patience and Penitentia is about observing the way silence plays out in our relationships, how endless it can feel and ultimately how we hope for reconciliation, love and understanding to prevail. I create sensory, secular spaces for audiences to contemplate their own experiences and witness transformation through live ritual”

“Patience and Penitentia has involved over 40 local women contributing thousands of rose petals and their personal stories. I wanted to show how commonplace silence is, and how enduring it can feel like an endless penance. Conversely, the rose petals come from nurtured, cared for gardens. This represents a contrast, illuminating the long term care and resilience we are also capable of.”

Patience and Penitentia continues Sophia’s exploration of endurance, ritual and emotional reckoning, following her earlier durational work Regret, in which she carried the symbolic weight of audience-contributed regrets across a month-long performance. Her practice has since received national recognition, with Sophia named winner of the 2023 Ramsay Art Prize for Witness, further cementing her position as one of South Australia’s most compelling artists.

Working between Tarntanya/Adelaide and Berlin, Sophia continues to build a practice grounded in performance, endurance and the exploration of extreme psychological states.

Audiences are encouraged to attend Patience and Penitentia across its season, with the work unfolding over time through repeated action, presence and performance.

The performance ends on Aug 22nd with a highly anticipated finale between 4.00pm and 5.00pm.