Page 116 - ARTE!Brasileiros #38

ART AS RESISTANCE ENGLISH VERSION

Kataloki, two independent productions by Arnaldo Antunes, a The image was indeed taken from one of his works, Transarquitetônica
graphic-literary hybrid of collective authorship. For Pereira, the (2014), which he designed for the building used by the Museum
editorial market of independent products laid dormant since the of Contemporary Art (MAC), in São Paulo. It was a humongous
1980s. He points out that collections like his have the ability to installation of tunnels made of hoarding boards; only, there was
synthesize ideas around ideological movements, such as the the anteroom of this aseptic environment, as counterpoint to what
case of the punk production. Oliveira had created until then. The visitors passed through it
There is a specific collection that became notable because and, as they walked toward the work’s interior, the path gradually
its owner, the artist Fábio Morais, seven years ago started to transformed, from minimalism to barroque. At first the grout
digitize the items he has been acquiring for over twenty years between the bricks was revealed, then the render work; and, at
and exhibiting them on his blog Bacanas Books (bacanasbooks. the end, the tunnels acquired the features of arteries and roots.
blogspot.com.br/), where he also writes reviews of the works. It While at the same time in antithesis to Oliveira’s universe, the image
is worth visiting the website – which Morais classifies as “diary of the white room warns us – we must pay attention to what lies
of an artist” – and spending a few hours browsing the collection, behind the surfaces. The book establishes, on the first pages, the
with publications signed by Lucia Mindlin Loeb, Emily Dickinson chronological evolution of what Oliveira created, not as a sequence
and Roni Horn. marked only by time, but as layers of juxtaposed fabric. Behind the
Morais relates the practice to another moment of our recent clean façade, we discover the structural complexity of the plywood
history, prior to the punk fever, which was the strengthening of boards and variations.
conceptual art in the 1960s and, in this context, the appearance, Published through a partnership between Sesi-SP Editora, Cosac
as a way of “acting outside the market”, of the so-called mail Naify and Galeria Millan, the book, with its chronological introduction,
art (with items sent by mail). Coincidence or not, Paulo Bruscky, reveals that Oliveira’s oeuvre started out from a bi-dimensional
from Recife, one of the most important representatives of the orientation and gradually gained volume. The spatial occupation that
genre, will be featured at the next Venice Biennale. He also derives from his creations, however, maintains a closer relationship
created pieces using Xerox machines. to painting than to sculpture, as is clear both in the text by Agnaldo
Writing about Revista Obstáculo n° 1, edited by Pedro Zylbersztajn Farias and in the interview with Oliveira conducted by Aracy Amaral.
and purchased at the Rio de Janeiro fair Pão de Forma, Morais In parallel with the work made with the hoarding boards (and later
makes and interesting analysis on the environment of the fairs, also with other materials), the artist dedicated himself to painting,
pointing out the high supplies and the mood of “everything is acrylic being his favorite technique.
allowed”. “A fair is exactly this – an absurd and chaotic amount The media chosen by Oliveira are rarely independent of the
of information each person must sift through. For those who context in which they lie; they originate from the idea of site-
think that ‘fairs are too confusing, too Babelish,’ I carry the specific, keeping an open relationship with their surroundings
answer on the tip of my tongue – orgy: if you can’t handle it, as well to re-signify spaces, what leads Farias to claim, for
why bother come?” instance, that one of Oliveira’s works, Tapumes (2003),
stands between painting, relief, installation and architecture.
1 | IMAGE FROM LENORA DE BARROS, PUBLISHED ON AN INDEPENDENT BOOK Later on, the curator points out that this is “an oeuvre that greatly
reveals the involvement of experimentation with the political action
2 | ITEMS FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE LITERATURE TEACHER IURI PEREIRA, REGULAR in a world that sweeps its logic of accumulation under the carpet”,
VISITOR TO SECOND-HAND BOOKSTORES AND FAIRS DEDICATED TO THE INDEPENDENT establishing in the nature of the material its vocation for disposal
EDITORIAL PRODUCTION (when used by the construction industry) and for permanent use
(in the precarious building of the favelas). “The hoarding board is a
3 | LIVIA PRESTES SHOWS HER COLLECTION OF GRAPHIC NOVELS; ACTRESS KEEPS A powerful material, an amalgam of matters and times,” says Farias,
BOOK WHERE SHE REGISTERS ALL THE ITEMS SHE LOANS introducing this facet of the hoarding board which the book will
uncover further ahead.
BOOK HENRIQUE OLIVEIRA | PAGES 90 TO 93 After the stage of transit between the bi-dimensional and volumetric
explorations, Oliveira expands his vocabulary of meanings and
THE SKIN WE LIVE IN depictions. Works such as Xilonoma Chamusquius (2010) started to
portray the shapes that refer to animal tissues and also to cancer.
“At a certain moment, when my works started to suggest organic
BOOK TRACES HENRIQUE OLIVEIRA’S CAREER AND ITS CREATIVE shapes that remind us of tumors, I resorted to books on pathology,”
PROCESS WITH HOARDING BOARDS AND OTHER MATERIALS USED BY he tells in his interview with Amaral.
CIVIL ENGINEERING; ARTIST ESTABLISHED A VISUAL RELATIONSHIP The conversation is long and painstaking when it goes on to
contemplate Oliveira’s studies of the materials. The artist’s career
BETWEEN THE URBAN MESH AND DIFFERENT FABRICS OF ANIMAL starts with the discovery of the potential of the hoarding board when
AND PLANT ORIGIN he was studying Arts at ECA (USP) and, with his own car, he used
to drive around searching for plywood boards in dumpsters in São
BY GUSTAVO FIORATTI Paulo. Often, he says, the material from one work was used in the
following one. Over time, Oliveira also studied the combination of
IT SEEMS TO ME MORE OF A JOKE. The photograph that opens more than one medium, adding paint to the wooden surfaces. And,
the book Henrique Oliveira, a broad overview of the oeuvre the finally, he explored the use of related materials used in engineering,
artist initiated at the turn of the century, shows no trace of the vehicle bodies, foam, PVC and wire.
material which he turned into his signature: the hoarding board. Much of Oliveira’s experiments and search are filled with lackluster
The first image of the book depicts a sterile spatial conception stories. “The work Litossoma (pages 96–7), for instance, went like
and straight lines, a white corridor very close to a hospital room, this. I first built the volume, then glued to it some stucco wire mesh I
lit by even whiter lighting. The organic expression that, a few found in a dumpster and some natural fiber mesh soaked in plaster,
pages later, will actually reveal Oliveira’s universe, full of curves, which was part of the ceiling of some house. It was white and was
colors and strange shapes, is absent there. rolled like a blanket in a dumpster. It was all brittle and cracked. But,

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