The diversity of themes, poetics and approaches of the 21st edition of Sesc_Videobrasil is one of its highlights. There are no redundancies or overlaps between the more than 60 works selected for the show, which for the first time in history has a definite lead even before the call. Imagined Communities a motto inspired by Benedict Anderson’s work, becomes a potent but nonimposing guide that has brought together a wide range of research whose main common feature may be the delicate manner in which they deal with often dramatic issues.

Destruction, threat of extermination, distorted view of the world due to racial, economic or social prejudice are largely dealt with by the 50 artists selected by the judging committee and the 5 invited by the curator. And yet, a certain subtlety predominates in the show, a bet on the transformative power of art, which does not have to scream to be heard. Some examples clearly demonstrate this defense of utopia in the face of contemporary tragedy. Working prominently in the exhibition, the series of urban landscape photos taken by England-based Syrian Hrair Sarkissian subtly and surprisingly deals with totalitarian repressions by showing places where public executions are often made in various countries where punishment of death is state policy.

Peruvian Claudia Martínez Garay explores with a mix of subtlety and sharp aim the annihilation of indigenous ancestral culture and the effects of colonization on indigenous people. She appears in the exhibition with two works: the installation titled Somos aún! , made from the sum of a series of anthropomorphic sculptures, which mix traces of ancient cultures with a persistent defense of popular imagination, and a touching video, I Survived to you, in which close-up images are seen of the shapes of an ancient 7th-century vase of Moche civilization, famous for its pottery work, kept at the Ethnological Museum in Berlin. While getting lost in the twisting and mysterious forms of this archaeological object, the viewer hears a strange, somewhat surreal narrative, made in the first person by the vase, narrating from its making to its closure in a distant museum.

The ancient culture of its people is also the theme of Dana Awartani’s work. In a specular relationship between video and installation, the Arabian artist makes a critical comment about the abandonment of the millenary Hejazi architecture, typical of her region until the beginning of an overwhelming modernization process that began in the 1950s. Dana covers the floor of her installation with a beautifully patterned, typically Islamic tile carpet patiently made with colored sands. The ephemerality of the composition is even more evident in the video, which shows the artist sweeping the same formation in one of the few houses with such architecture still in Saudi Arabia.

Of course the presence of the video is striking in the show, but it is by no means hegemonic. Many works combine language with other forms of expression such as painting, photography and drawing, or simply incorporate typical video procedures into works that do without moving image, as can be seen in works such as those by Brazilian André Griffo, from the Malinese. Tiécoura N’Daou and Tunisian Nidal Chamekh, who travel freely through different media to develop a work of high political resistance. In other words, the event puts us in front of a series of works that speak, in the words of artistic director Solange Farkas, “different languages ​​for very similar situations”.

In terms of denunciation, the highlight of the show is the work related to the indigenous population, taking from the invisibility the drama of those populations increasingly threatened by violence and that have long been relegated to a position of invisibility. Collective groups such as the Alto Amazonas Audiovisual, which brings together indigenous anthropologists and filmmakers, sew and dialogue images captured in the region. There are also historical records such as interviews made by filmmaker Andrea Tonacci with indigenous leaders in the late 1970s that only now, in 2014, were recovered and restored. But there are still in the show, and in chorus, strong warning voices about the situation of communities and groups in search of survival and affective spaces of conviviality and struggle. This effort is epitomized by the incisive action led by Mexican Teresa Margolles, one of five artists specially invited to participate in the Biennale, which denounces the brutal violence against transsexuals. The work, entitled Priscilla Present honors the stabbed transvestite a year ago in downtown São Paulo and unfolds into three different elements: performance action, embroidery and video. Or in the paintings by No Martins, who associates powerful portraits of black figures to the phrase “It is enough!”

The internationalization of Sesc_Videobrasil With 21 editions and 36 years of existence, Sesc_Videobrasil is one of the most powerful and long-lived cultural events in the country. In the current edition, which can be seen until February 2020, at Sesc 24 de Maio, the show has made some important changes in its structure. Among them are the incorporation of a theme not only for the selection of works, but already announced before the artists registered their projects (Imagined Communities was the guiding thread adopted for the current edition); the expansion of the curatorial team; and – perhaps the most impactful of changes – the transformation of the event into a Biennial. The term Biennial, incorporated into the title of the event that is now called the Sesc_Videobrasil Contemporary Art Biennial, is not just periodic information or a brand hit. Taking on itself as an event of its kind inserts the now biennial into a broad international agenda of contemporary art. It is a way of reaffirming itself as part of a broad and active circuit of cultural action. Brazil already has two other important Biennials, São Paulo and Mercosur, but the field of Videobrasil is well defined: it acts clearly against the hegemonic nuclei, bringing together artists and thinkers from Africa, America, the Middle East and Brazil. Caribbean “This is the place we have to research, we have to investigate,” says Solange Farkas, founder and current artistic director of the project. She makes a point of stressing the importance of keeping the event always ready for adaptations. Sesc_Videobrasil has already resembled a movie show, has taken on the identity of a major festival and is now completing an important step in this slow process of moving from the black box of the movie theater to the “white cube” of the exhibition space. “The first decade was to understand video production in Brazil”, explains Solange. In the 1990s, there is a certain disappointment, a frustration of the hope that video would occupy a more significant place in the cultural scene. “We went from romanticism to pragmatism, and in the face of the realization that we were not going to occupy TV, people began to investigate and experiment more intensely with the specifics of language”. In the wake of this process, there was an important process of internationalization, first gathering and showing in Brazil the best of the international scene and the historical basis of video art and, subsequently, making room for a young, intense, hard-to-reach production from the south. geopolitical “There was a lack of knowledge, a great ignorance about the history of the video here”, says. The result of this mapping can be measured in the archive of almost three thousand works gathered in the Videobrasil Association’s collection, available for consultation. “It is a broad material that allows us to understand this place of critical invisibility”, she adds. According to her, the strategy of assuming itself as a specialized biennial has been drawing for three editions, when it brought Olafur Eliasson’s work to Brazil. Among the challenges facing the new model of the event, Solange cites the increase of international and local dialogues, adding groups and issues traditionally relegated to the margins. “It’s no use getting self-conscious”, she concludes.

ARTE!Brasileiros – What is the history of Unifor Plástico? How does it work, how is the selection of artists performed?

Denise Mattar – The 1st Plastic Unifor opened its doors in 1973, the year the University of Fortaleza was created, showing the vocation of the Edson Queiroz Foundation and its proximity to the regional and national arts and culture. From its inception, it worked through a public notice and the works were chosen by a notorious commission in the arts field. From 2013, a more curatorial model was adopted and started to operate every two years as the Unifor.

The first two exhibitions were curated by art critic and curator Ivo Mesquita. He did, in one of the exhibitions, a tribute to Sérvulo Esmeraldo, called A Constellation for Sérvulo Esmeraldo.

When I thought about the current exhibition, focusing on a cast of Ceará artists, I was careful to select a significant number of artists, but allowing an unpolluted show. With the help of Cecilia Dedê, and together with conversations with Bitu Cassundé, from the Dragão do Mar cultural center, which has a wide knowledge of Ceará’s history, I looked at almost 100 portfolios and ended up editing approximately 25 artists.

Do you feel that the contact with these artists brought you a differential?

I have noticed for many years in the North and Northeast production. In 2012, I went to Belém and met Emmanuel Nassar, born in Capanema, Pará, with a work that impressed me deeply. In fact, being out of the Rio-São Paulo axis, artists from the North and Northeast are harmed. I knew his sparse works and not the whole work. For the first time I made an important exhibit of him at the CCBB of Rio and Brasilia and I’m sure that contributed to his visibility. I saw several exhibitions by curator Paulo Herkenhoff who, in my opinion, was of great importance to make this understanding of Brazil as a whole, donated much of his time to know these new production centers.

What caught your attention most when looking at this set?

On this occasion, what caught my attention was the repeated use of the word. I saw in the works presented a common thread: the word.

Used sporadically throughout history in paintings and tapestries, the word was incorporated into the fine arts more steadily in the early 20th century, from the modernist avant-garde. Marcel Duchamp was deep in this idea and used the term “differentiated simultaneities” to define the articulation between the verbal and visual fields. One of the artists best known for this imbrication is Leonilson, whose work belongs to this ethos. This idea gave the name to the exhibition: Simultaneity – the art with the word.

Can we name some of its main features?

Some are more conceptual and others more visceral.

Francisco de Almeida has a special room. His work as a woodcutter is highly regarded. Son of a goldsmith father, embroidering mother and grandson of a lace-up grandmother, he grew up in an environment that founded his imaginary universe. Allegories, religion, a fantastic world, built by sometimes real figures: the beatos, the sertanejo man and the caatinga; sometimes for figures from the religious or magical world, such as saints and angels.

Attended university, participated in exhibitions in Fortaleza, traveled a lot, participated in the Panorama of Brazilian Art of MAM, in São Paulo, in 2005; the Valencia Biennial in 2007 and the VII Mercosur Biennial in Porto Alegre in 2009. In the words of the critic Pedro Costa: “The deal with mothers; its endless effects of engraving, inking and printing; its permanent reuse and arrangements will make Francisco de Almeida a researcher-craftsman, a recorder par excellence”.

But I would like to highlight several of the artists I chose who were the result of this dive. Henrique Viudez, a young artist, with a work of this kind that I call “more visceral”, works with painting, truck canvas and its interferences. It is more figurative and broadens research on beliefs, myths and religiosity. It also works gender issues and binary conventions male, female, with great quality of execution. It has a more allegorical work.

On the other hand, there is a very young artist, Iago Barreto, who works with the Tapebas Indians, a native indigenous society gathered in the village of Nossa Senhora dos Prazeres de Caucaia, and which originated the municipality of the same name, in the city of Fortaleza. He is fully involved in this truly dedicated culture. He lives with the community, and in an authentic, non-marketer way as some artists end up adopting. He uses the language of the body work of the Indians at the intersection with photography, brings the Indian to the present, in his own space, but attentive to contemporary issues.

Then you have an artist like Rian Fontenele, more consolidated, with a larger work, and who, however, does not have the visibility that, in my opinion, should have.

Therefore, I also tried to show works of various aspects. Haroldo Saboia, for example, made a video showing cities in the interior of Ceará whose names are Desert, Pleasures, Mirages and Passages.

Diego de Santos presents burned shells, small sculptures, bringing the idea of ​​real estate speculation, where the advance burns the houses and the residents leave their “shell houses” leaving everything behind.

Bia de Paula too, with Every son is a motherfucker. When he began his work, he wanted to do something about his parents’ absence from home, but as he interviewed the women, he realized that this was not an issue for them. On the other hand, he found another, much richer story, the potency of these women, who had left it behind and faced life with their own strength. It has wonderful photos and testimonials.

I liked a lot of people. The Virginia Pinho that did the work on Maracanaú, where there was that necrosario who was later extinct, but who lived still there. People have bonded with that region and do not leave that place, which was a prison for them.

All the works were already existing, there was no commissioned work. Just Nivardo Victoriano, who had a smaller photo production, and then we made a suggestion to enlarge the photos. He works with pain.

What strikes me is that the production of Ceará is very poetic. All works have a concern to question the problems, the environment, the status quo, but with an unexpected poetic footprint for me. They have stories, twine, embroidery.

When I showed the works, they commented to me: “Wow, how it looks like Leonilson”. And I said, “No. It’s just that Leonilson belongs to this place”.

The Superfictions conceived by Guerreiro do Divino Amor could also be called, according to himself, hyperrealistic, neorealistic or documentary. For through them, in the series of works entitled World Superficial Atlas, the 36-year-old Swiss-born artist based in Rio brings to light some of the deepest and most complex themes of our society, both geopolitical and collective imaginary. Current – and not fictional – issues such as political, religious, media and marketing powers, social inequalities, state violence, and population whitening strategies.

In videos that unfold in panels, magazines and other media, Guerreiro presents the superficial universes of each city or region in which he works, from an apocalyptic perspective and the realization that we live in war. From 2005 to now have been immersions in Brussels, Rio, Sao Paulo, Minas Gerais and Brasilia. The artist does not fear “call a spade a spade” when he prints in the videos, “like totems”, faces of powerful figures such as Silvio Santos, Doria, Bonner, Cunha, Malafaia and Pastor Davi Miranda. He was even sued by Miranda’s daughter, but acquitted “in a very pretty sentence. A relief, because today we do not know what to expect from justice”.

With a very peculiar aesthetic, strong colors and references to the internet universe, the artist questions the tasteful ideas and hegemonic visual patterns, sometimes in a mocking and ironic way. With a degree in architecture in Brussels, he says he found the usual way of presenting projects, all a bit gray and neutral, “a nonsense.” He preferred to resume his references from childhood and adolescence, from soap operas and music videos to Xuxa shows – “I think pop moves the heart more, has this direct and wider impact” – and deepens “the research of aesthetics as fiction, while observe how each social segment creates a fictional aesthetic that carries well-defined codes”.

His Atlas should now win episodes in Switzerland, “which has this perfectionary narrative of perfection”, in Italy, “in search of the roots of Christianity and fascism, very important for understanding Sao Paulo and southern Brazil”, and in Mexico. Guerreiro was the winner of this year’s Pipa Prize, one of the most important visual arts prizes in the country, and was interviewed by ARTE!Brasileiros.

ARTE!Brasileiros – To begin with, I would like to ask you where this name comes from, Guerreiro do Divino Amor (Warrior of the Divine Love), and what it means to you.

Guerreiro do Divino Amor – Warrior is my last name. Divino Amor was a joke that came about when I was a teenager and my father was dating a church pastor. She wanted to get me into the church, and it was a bit of a tease, I wanted to set up a heavy metal band to act in the church. It never happened, but I really liked the name, that means Warrior of the Divine Love. Then it gained many meanings linked to my work and life, until today it represents something as my life mission.

Could they ever get you into church?

No. In fact I was very curious about that neopentecostal universe that I didn’t know well. It was one of the engines of my work, trying to understand that overwhelming faith and at the same time with a very strong, colorful aesthetic. It was engaging.

It seems to me that many of your life experiences are very present in your work. You have talked about another part of the family that comes from a decaying aristocracy, besides their formation in Europe…

Yes, I think it was an engine. They lived in Europe, in a context where everyone was relatively mixed, and from time to time frequented family in Brazil, they were a deeply racist people, very futile, but with a certain cultured veneer, an obsession for power, hierarchy and status and the certainty of knowing that everything and everyone is in their place. I wanted to understand what were the mechanisms of perpetuation of this caste that continued to live in colonial Brazil without being disturbed. And also of this evangelical world. They are worlds within themselves, with answers to everything. I began to dig, to dig, and it began to appear as a bottomless hole with very old and deep roots, complex and perverse logic of domination. The work is all about unraveling these structures, which because they are so old and familiar form like an ecosystem, a given, timeless thing. And see the role of media, family, genealogy, inheritance, symbolic capital in this maintenance. The SuperRio, the second chapter of the Atlas, is a more direct portrayal of this attempt to understand what was around me and its relationship to more global marketing phenomena, corporate logic, and how it influences people’s minds and actions, what are their strategies and how does this translate to all scales, from individual to geopolitical. Then I explored other adjacent phenomena. So it began, in trying to understand these universes and the relations between them, and I still work on these issues.

And how do these Superfictions, these chapters, relate to each other in this great World Atlas?

In the beginning each project had its independence, explored its own themes. Only later I understood this as an Atlas. These are chapters that relate, with issues that go through the whole work, such as the ideas of empire and galaxy, the war between civilizations in their different social, religious, economic, symbolic and aesthetic facets, the different strategies of whitening the population. In the first chapter in Brussels, it was a more strictly analytical thing. It is a very poor city and dirty by European standards, but with an attempt to build itself as a world city scenario, capital of Europe. And when I was studying architecture, I began to realize a very warlike discourse, conquering minds and space. This idea runs through all the work in different ways. And the idea of ​​superfiction really came in the next work in Rio, which I wrote in 2005 and resumed in 2013, in the pre-World Cup and Olympics period, the apex of Rio’s superfiction. Many times in my videos, I start from tourist films, advertisements, which is how the city wants to sell itself, what fiction it will create to export, this image creation.

But you start from what the city wants to show to expose what the city doesn’t want to show…

Yes, as they are very elaborate and ancient constructions, I try to identify the symbolic and historical roots and their different manifestations, how these fictions are incorporated into the collective imagination of the city, and how they act and are instrumentalized in the different wars for power. In the case of Minas this is also very strong. Minas is a bit of “red hot cuteness”. No one will speak badly of Minas Gerais, which has that food, an ideal of hospitality. But other than that it’s a place of power, of money, it’s one of the few states that doesn’t have Black Consciousness Day, despite its past, it’s all very veiled.

In the surface you work with various planes and layers of power that characterize societies as politics, religion, media, police, market. How do you choose these worked themes?

It’s very natural, coming to places and watching, feeling, talking. Of course all of these layers are present everywhere, but in each they act differently with other narratives. For example, religion works in different ways in every place, even with very different physical constructs and different preaching styles. But deep down, with the same desire for conquest. In the case of the media too. In Rio, for example, it has a very strong media construction through both soap operas and police news, creating this schizophrenic narrative, represented by the wind rose in the SuperRio. In MG you always see a narrative of a “back to the soil”, a more rural image, a more pure idea, and this is exalted in the media.

And your work is always questioning these official narratives, bringing hidden things.

Yes, the fiction of racial democracy, for example, which in each place is narrated in a way. And it is one of the central fictions of Brazil’s construction, which serves to appease, exploit. This denial of the slave past. Speaking of Minas again, which is the coolest thing for me, there’s all this instrumentalization of the Chica da Silva myth. Everywhere you go there is this narrative that says “look, there’s Chica da Silva, rich, beautiful slave”. And then it looks like it’s all right. The thing gets more subtle, but perhaps for that very reason more perverse. With this layer of honey, sweet frosting.

In addition to dealing with real cities, many real figures also emerge. How do you choose these characters and how do they fit into the work?

They are icons, right? They are like totems. For example, Silvio Santos, his life, his career, is like a São Paulo totem. It is the embodiment of the myth of meritocracy. And working in photoshop I saw that he and João Doria have very similar traits. So at work they come together as one. They complement each other. Because Doria is also like a caricature, an archetype of the heir, of savage capitalism. You see these figures and you already know what they are about, they already bring a whole universe together. And they are not abstract phenomena. These are people who are acting there, an army. Of course there are many others, it is much more complex than that.

You once said that your work seeks to deal with the complexity of apocalypse. You also said that the whole work is about war on different levels. Anyway, are we in the apocalypse? Are we into war?

There is this perception that there is an apocalypse, at all levels, in the matter of natural resources for example. And the work tries to see these details, as this is a construction, it is a war that comes from far away. In Brasilia’s work, for example, I saw these cycles, as in the inauguration of Brasília reenacted the first mass of Brazil, of the time of the conquest. It is an apocalypse that has been preparing for many centuries, but now it is as if it were the apotheotic moment, which came in earnest. And working on it, messing with these things is sometimes scary. It became clearer throughout the chapters, having its apex in Brasilia, where the research was done at the time of the 2018 elections. It seems that the slaveholders got the perfect formula. The combination of the power of faith with emotional marketing and information technology is overwhelming.

At the same time as we have this apocalyptic framework, the artistic milieu has given recognition to works that deal with racial, indigenous, gender, and so on.

You just won Pipa, for example. Is it a resistance to the apocalypse?

I think maybe the art world has awakened more now too because things started to reach a “whiteness” that was quiet, protected, trapped in a romanticism. But there are people who were already used to persecution, who have wisdom about being at war. And I think the arts may now turn more to these, the ones who already know what it’s about. When there is a need, everything is learned faster.