THE TRADITIONAL International Paraty Literary Festival in the state of Rio de Janeiro, which this year takes place between July 10 and 14, has never stopped reinventing itself and exploring novelties to compose its structures. This will be the 17th edition of the event and curated by the journalist and editor Fernanda Diamant, one of the creators of the magazine Quatro Cinco Um, specialized in literature. The honoree of the time is Rio de Janeiro writer and journalist Euclides da Cunha (1866-1909), author of the acclaimed book Os Sertões, considered by many a work that initiates literary journalism in the country, long before the term exists.
Among the transitions and news, Flip’s organization, which has Mauro Munhoz’s general direction, has announced a desire to encourage the development of activities related to the visual arts in the itinerary of the event, in addition to what happens spontaneously through the city. This is how the Terra Nova project was presented, a visual arts module that intends to carry out interventions that integrate Paraty in a way: “From the beginning, Flip has the intersection between the arts in their DNA. Year after year, we were building an approximation between different artistic experiences, including the visual arts. Now we feel the need to make this relationship manifest in a more visible way. Terra Nova is an artistic device to illuminate issues that permeate the territory of the city, its residents and its visitors. One of Flip’s missions is to investigate how art can help to qualify people’s look at human relations produced in public spaces, and Newfoundland will propose mechanisms of perception of this territory and its complexities through art”, Mauro said to ARTE!Brasileiros.
The project was launched in early June during an event at Casa do Parque, in São Paulo, where the patron program specially developed for this initiative was presented. The patronage plan is aimed at individuals and is the main and exclusive way to make this idea viable. Those who wish to contribute to the project will have some benefits such as tickets, preferential access to Flip’s main programming that takes place in the Matriz Auditorium, invitations to other events held by the organization of the fair and exclusive works of Laura Vinci, artist confirmed to participate in the first intervention of Terra Nova.
Invited by the curator, Vinci will present its On Air installation, last presented in 2017, at MuBE, in São Paulo, and has already passed through several places, including some countries in Europe. Other interventions are still being discussed for budgetary feasibility issues, and even so the presentation of the employers’ program was crucial to that everything began to be established. The choice of No Air to integrate the debut of the project was discussed between the artist and the curator: “It’s a job that has this characteristic to adapt a lot, it reinvents itself in place. It is a work that is mist, it is just steam. So it sticks easy to the spatial situation. It has works that require specific spatiality and the No Air does not, it only needs water”, says the artist. The fluidity of the vapor in Laura’s work allows the public to discover different forms in the variations that the smoke creates in the space, besides the characteristic of the work itself transforming the place where it is.
About the interdisciplinarity that permeates Flip and the proposal to insert the arts more punctually, Laura has no doubt that the country is experiencing a time when collaboration between the areas is something necessary: ”This is a very important thing for us , expand that and fortify those relationships”, she says. For her, there are some areas that link more punctually and strongly with literature, such as cinema. “In the visual arts this is not so clear, but I think we can start to find these encounters”, Laura commenta, citing as an example of this confluence her work, Machine of the World, which focuses on a poem by Carlos Drummond de Andrade.
VISUAL ARTS AT THE MATRIZ AUDITORIUM
In Flip’s most disputed schedule, which takes place in an auditorium set up inside Paraty’s main church, the visual arts will also be present in various formats. On Thursday, July 11, photographer Maureen Bissiliat will be interviewed by Miguel de Castillo and Rita Palmeira at table 6, titled Serra Grande. The English photographer based in Brazil dedicated herself to the encounter between the word, the image and the geography along its trajectory, known especially for its work with the Xingu peoples. At table 12, Mata de Corda, the artist Grada Kilomba is questioned by Kalaf Epalanga and Lilia Schwarcz on the questions that surround her book Memórias da Plantação, to be released during the event by the publisher Cobogó. In it, the artist discusses themes such as race, class, gender and post-colonialism, already present in her work. Then, at table 13, Ailton Krenak and José Celso Martinez Correa talk about the valorization of culture, fertile lands for art and diversity, mediated by Camila Mota. The activities take place on July 12, and the next day, tables with Ismail Xavier, Miguel Gomes, Grace Passô, Marina Pessoa and José Miguel Wisnik will also bring the visual arts to the fair in their discussions around cinema, drama, art and literature.
Whether in the recovery of “a religious memory and the mystical force of Afro-Bahian culture” made by Heraclitus, in the reconstruction of history and in reflection on it “from the record of what is necessary to keep within history and not forget” made by Pagatini or Centurión’s awareness of AIDS in a “personal chronicle of his way to death” Solo sector is bringing countries closer to the continent through common issues.
In the Masters sector, former Repertório, the new curator, Tiago Mesquita, did not seek a thematic or historical axis. The art critic says that the curatorial experience of an event like SP-Arte is still very new for him: “It’s very unusual in relation to other works that I’ve curated”.
Tiago chose to bring to the Masters works produced between the 50s and 80s, because they are works that “we can look at with a certain temporal distance” to understand them and also to understand the production of their respective authors. Carlos Fajardo (Marcelo Guarnieri), Ridyas (Central) and a project by Rubens Gerchman (Surface), among others.
The biggest surprise is perhaps in the Performance sector. Marcos Gallon, who also organizes the VERBO art performance show, chose not to allocate a space only for the works that will be presented. The performances took place in spaces destined to them scattered among the exhibitors. Gallon’s idea is to encourage the galleries to also take their performance artists, so the genre is incorporated as another possible medium of art, not marginalized in a closed corner. Also, according to Gallon, the vast majority of art galleries in the state of São Paulo represent artists who work with performance.
Gallon is also driven by the idea of encouraging collectors to buy performances, make them look at it as something that can be sold through the galleries: “So it’s brought to the trade show’s axis.” For this, SP-Arte will buy one of the works presented and donate to the collection of the São Paulo Pinacoteca. The work will be chosen by the staff of the institution, led by Jochen Volz. The artists Cadu (Vermelho), Cristiano Lenhardt (Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel), Jorge Soledar (Portas Vilaseca), Maria Noujaim (Jaqueline Martins Gallery) and Jaime Lauriano (Galeria Leme/AD) will be in the sector.
