Carlos Motta

Composite developed the visual identity for Your Monsters, Our Idols, the largest U.S. exhibition to date by Colombian-born, New York-based artist Carlos Motta. The show celebrates Motta’s ongoing exploration of radical difference, giving form to histories, identities, and narratives that challenge dominant power structures.

As part of the exhibition, Composite also contributed typography to The Columbus Assembly, a room-filling multichannel sound installation premiering at Your Monsters, Our Idols. Supported by a Wexner Center Artist Residency Award, the work engages artists, activists, and scholars in a critical dialogue about the stakes of renaming Columbus, Ohio—the largest city in the world bearing the name of Christopher Columbus. Addressing the entangled legacies of colonialism and patriarchy, The Columbus Assembly examines how symbolic acts of recognition can serve as catalysts for broader movements toward decolonization, radical equity, and restorative justice.

Composite’s typographic interventions took on a physical presence in the space: a custom red carpet, emblazoned with Columbus’ name in a sinister blackletter, evoked the weight of historical violence, while on the wall, a more ephemeral and delicate composition of the word Beloved—drawn from Toni Morrison’s seminal novel—offered a poignant counterpoint. A proposed re-naming, “Beloved, Ohio,” hovered as both question and possibility, inviting reflection on how language shapes collective memory and futures yet to be written.