Ana Torfs

The Day You Were Thinking About the Sibyl While You Were Picking Autumn Leaves

Artist Ana Torfs realised a monumental installation titled ‘The Day You Were Thinking About the Sibyl While You Were Picking Autumn Leaves’ , consisting of 28 Jacquard-woven tapestries. During the Covid pandemic, Torfs collected brightly coloured autumn leaves during her walks. This reminded her of the ‘Cumaean Sibyl from Vergil’s Aeneid’, the famous Latin epic in which she wrote her prophecies on leaves. Torfs pressed the leaves between the pages of international newspapers, photographed the compositions, and translated them into textiles. Each tapestry presents a woven leaf above a newspaper article, accompanied by personal and poetic texts. 

Although all 28 tapestries follow the same layout, each work required an individual approach. Torfs wove the leaves using a shiny cotton yarn, while the newspaper articles were woven with organic cotton yarns with a matte finish. For each tapestry, she carefully determined the number of colours needed for the leaf, and where additional contrast was required in the newspaper image. In this way, variation and nuance were achieved within a strict structural framework. 

The work has been on display since 3 October 2025 in the historic halls of the Paintings Gallery in Vienna, where the tapestries are spread across four museum rooms. The woven artworks can be viewed in the historic galleries from 3 October 2025 until 30 August 2026.