Rossini Perez

Rossini Quintas Perez (Macaíba, Rio Grande do Norte, 1931 - Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, 2020). Engraver, painter. Moves with his family to Rio de Janeiro in 1940. In 1951, attends the Brazilian Drawing Association and takes classes with the painter Ado Malagoli (1906-1994). During a visit to the 2nd São Paulo International Biennial in 1953, he was impressed by the engravings by Edvard Munch (1863-1944) and decided to devote himself to this technique. In Rio de Janeiro, he studied at the Escolinha de Arte do Brasil and was supervised by Oswaldo Goeldi (1895-1961). Around 1952, he was a student of Iberê Camargo (1914-1994) and, in 1953, of Fayga Ostrower (1920-2001). In the same year he took part in the 1st National Exhibition of Abstract Art at the Hotel Quitandinha in Petrópolis, Rio de Janeiro. In the 1950s, his works deal with subjects such as boats, the hills and slums of Rio de Janeiro. In 1959, he became assistant to Johnny Friedlaender (1912-1992) at the Printmaking Studio of the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro (MAM/RJ), where he taught from that year until 1961. He perfected his skills in lithography at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, on a scholarship, in 1962. He lived in Paris from 1962 to 1972. Helped set up a metal engraving workshop at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts [National School of Fine Arts] in Dakar, Senegal, between 1974 and 1975, and taught there in 1977 and 1978. Back in Brazil, he taught at the Creativity Center of the Cultural Foundation of the Federal District, in Brasilia, in 1978, and at the Printmaking Studio of MAM/RJ, from 1983 to 1986.

In the 1980s, Rossini made a large donation of prints and posters to the National Library, including metal engravings, lithographs and serigraphs. From 2010 on, he started donating again to the Iconografia collection and, with an admirable and generous way of acting, he made sure that his pieces were divulged through digital images. The Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, an institution of the Secretariat of Culture, presented in 2013, the exhibition Rossini Perez: Um passante e duas margens. With 88 works, it integrates engravings and matrices made by the artist between 1955 and 1980. The works are part of the set of 104 engravings and matrices that were donated by the artist in 2009 to the Pinacoteca de São Paulo, offering a comprehensive overview of his production. In addition, it accompanied the compilation of information about his works. His most recent donation contemplates an art form to which he has always dedicated himself and that becomes more and more significant every day: photography. Rossini contemplates the city of Rio with eyes loaded with sensitivity, looking and capturing from architectural details to urban spaces focusing on our losses and gains. These are photos from 1976 that participated, in 2015, in an exhibition at the Art Museum of Rio (MAR). 

Por: Sala Rússia