Page 111 - ARTE!Brasileiros #40

of a historical, linear narrative, the duo of curators brought the of the memory of slavery in a place extremely marked by processes
chaotic aspect of this city into the exhibition and created a show of exclusion, sanitation and destruction of its own memory. João
sewn by a broad set of themes, which juxtapose in a mesh which Paulo Racy’s Vias shows in practice how this violence occurs,
does not intend to enlighten, but to question. exhibiting in a loop the failed attempt of imploding a building
The option to avoid the concealing of problems is already clear constructed in Favela do Moinho.
in the title, São Paulo não é uma cidade [São Paulo is not a City], The growing social tensions and intolerance are also present in
in neon red in the center of the venue. Inspired by a text of the Giselle Beiguelman’s impactful installation Odiolândia. With a
philosopher Vilém Flusser (to whom São Paulo was merely an blunt simplicity, the artist aligns a sequence of phobic statements
“urban conglomerate”), the statement faces the city’s “un-public” collected in social networks, making perfectly clear the absolute
character and the works that address these contradictions are intolerance towards drug users. The process of collection and
precisely the high points of the show. articulation of vestiges is also at the base of Igor Vidor’s work, which
The exhibition has around twenty cores, with very different sizes denounces the permanence of torture by the law enforcement, in
and vocations, which embrace the central atrium where the a large panel with residues of clothes abandoned by underaged
municipality’s foundation is represented with an identical replica street dwellers persecuted by the police in the city’s central areas.
of the ground zero. The curators themselves define the show as a
sort of almanac in which a diverse and heterogeneous set of items, 1 | NEW ADS FOR SÃO PAULO (2011), FRANZ ACKERMANN
organized with different criteria communicate with one another.
Synthetically, it is possible to say that “São Paulo is not a city” 2 | JARAGUÁ (2014), CAIO RESEWITZ
amasses two parallel universes that interpenetrate: on the one
hand are the works that tell what we can call an “official history” 3 | 1) MAP OF THE CITY OF SÃO PAULO (1877), JULES MARTAN AND FERNANDO DE
and, on the other, a set of contemporary pieces that question, ALBUQUERQUE; 2) PHOTO BY CLÁUDIA ANDUJAR FROM THE SERIES RUA DIREITA, SÃO
provoke, inquire and criticize different aspects of urban life. PAULO (1970); 3) PARTIDA DO JAPÃO AO BRASIL (1935), SEIRO TAKAYAMA; 4)MOBÍLIA
The first block presents the cores that at times describe urban TOMADA (2016), RODRIGO BUENO; 5) PHOTO BY CLÁUDIA ANDUJAR FROM THE SERIES
features, at others pour over social or cultural aspects. They RUA DIREITA, SÃO PAULO (1970)
represent different economic periods—such as the Bandeiras and
the coffee age—; they emphasize milestones of landscape—such as 4 | ROSANA PAULINO, ASSENTAMENTO, 2013. INSTALLATION: VIDEO, WOOD, PAPER
the Anhangabaú valley and the Luz station—; or yet, they comment CLAY, DIGITAL PRINT ON FABRIC, LINOLEUM AND SEWING. COLLECTION OF THE ARTIST
on their most problematic cultural periods, such as the Week of
1922 and Concretism. Among the most prominent figures are the São Paulo is not a city - inventions from the center
iconic personalities of Mário de Andrade (the most ostensibly Through 01/28/2018
celebrated, both for his personal significance and for the vast Sesc 24 de Maio
collection he amassed), Oswald de Andrade, Ramos de Azevedo Rua 24 de Maio, 109 - Centro, São Paulo.
and Flávio de Carvalho. sescsp.org.br
The type of material exhibited is also very eclectic, from simple
elements such as earth, replicas of monuments, reproductions of EXHIBITION SÃO PAULO | PAGES 54 TO 57
news pieces to classic works of art and of the Brazilian iconography,
by the collector Ruy Silva e Souza and emblematic paintings of FROM THE ARCHIVE
such as a precious set of photographs from the 1800s donated
Nacional de Belas Artes, Institute for Brazilian Studies (IEB), Lasar TO THE MUSEUM
the Brazilian art belonging to important museums, such as Museu
Segall Museum and Pinacoteca do Estado. In total, there are more
than 400 items, whose appreciation demands time and very clear IN AN ANTHOLOGY AT ESTAÇÃO PINACOTECA, MAURO RESTIFFE
choices by the viewers, since the kaleidoscopic exhibition design EXHIBITS A SELECT REVIVAL OF HIS WORK SIDED WITH PAINTINGS,
does not set very clear routes, offering a broad array of paths
and possibilities of enjoyment. The grandiosity of the space—with SHEDDING LIGHT ONTO CONNECTIONS AND AMPLIFYING POSSIBILITIES
around 1,300 square meters—many structural columns and a high OF INTERPRETATION
ceiling contribute for the exhibition’s labyrinthine aspect.
Perhaps it is precisely because of this excess of information that BY MARIA HIRZMAN
works which go beyond the mere description or documentation
of facts stand out, works that not only complement this— MAURO RESTIFFE’S ANTHOLOGY, on view at Estação
geographically, economically and artistically—plural narrative from Pinacoteca, is one of those rare exhibitions that go beyond their
the facts usually linked to São Paulo’s history, but that reflect or main goal. In addition to promoting a faithful synthesis of the
take a stance in regards to it. These are interventions, mostly more artist’s work, the show touches upon a series of important and
recent or commissioned (giving the impression that this new space sensitive features for the study of contemporary art, such as
is destined to house a more recent contemporary production), the intense and troubled relationship between photography and
which question less visible aspects from the metropolis’ trajectory, painting; the various possibilities of interpretation of images
such as the permanent process of destruction and reconstruction and the revisit to archives; the persistence of the usefulness of
of the city promoted by an eternal search for “modernity.” categories of genre to look into art; the overlapping of fiction and
One of the cores that stand out in this type of questioning is that document; or even the persistence of formal models over time.
dedicated to the struggle nature vs. urban culture, personified The show is divided into three cores. The first room houses the
by Rodrigo Bueno’s work Sofá mata a dentro, a decaying piece of records which can be seen as more public, such as landscapes
bourgeois furniture that is gradually taken over by nature. or popular expressions. The second shows a more intimate side,
Jaime Lauriano’s intervention, one of the few works commissioned family, trips and friends. The third, in turn, houses exercises in
for the exhibition and still in process, throws salt on a much capturing the constructed space. The photographs surprise us by
sublimated but not less painful open wound: the process of erasure its technical quality, the artist’s compositional rigor, the option

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