Servulo Esmeraldo 2

Sérvulo Esmeraldo was born in the city of Crato, in the interior of the state of Ceará, on 27 February 1929. The third son of the couple Zaira Cordeiro Esmeraldo and Álvaro Esmeraldo, Sérvulo is a plural artist who explored throughout his career the various plastic languages, being considered a sculptor, engraver, illustrator and painter. In 1948, living in Fortaleza, he attended the Sociedade Cearense de Artes Plásticas (SCAP) and kept in touch with Inimá de Paula (1918-1999), António Bandeira (1922-1967) and Aldemir Martins (1922-2006). During this time he produced monotypes, paintings and woodcuts. In 1951, Sérvulo held an individual exhibition of paintings (monotypes) at the Sociedade de Cultura Artística do Crato and took part in the VII Salão de Abril, with four monotypes, and in the Salão Paulista de Arte Moderna, with woodcuts, at the Prestes Maia Gallery. In addition, that same year, he worked on the setting up of the 1st São Paulo Biennial. In 1955, Sérvulo began to make posters and illustrations for the covers of magazines such as São Paulo Magazine and Revista do Teatro Amador, as well as being an illustrator for the newspaper Correio Paulistano. In this year he also did his first proofs of metal engraving on zinc. In the following year, Sérvulo promoted his first individual exhibition in the Clube dos Artistas e Amigos das Artes with the title 39 Prints of Sérvulo Esmeraldo, and participated of the XIV Triennial of Milan. In 1957, the artist promoted a new individual exhibition of engravings, this time in the Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo, with the title 30 engravings of Sérvulo Esmeraldo. In the same year, he moved to the French capital due to a scholarship that he won from the French government to study at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts and began to study etching with Johnny Friedlaender (Silesia, Prussia, 1912 - Paris, 1992). In the 1960s, he stopped dedicating himself exclusively to etching and started experimenting with other languages such as three-dimensional and kinetic art. In 1962, he produced his first kinetic works, creating two years later the Excitable - kinetic objects made of acrylic, which react to the viewer's touch. In the same period he made his first sculptures in brushed steel and in the 1970s a series of sculptures in Plexiglas. During this period he participated in several exhibitions in Paris, Lyon and Montibéliard, France; Zurich and Geneva, Switzerland; Nottingan, England; Oregon, USA. During his time in Europe, Sérvulo Esmeraldo had contact with other Brazilian artists who lived there, such as Sergio Camargo, Lygia Clark, Rossini Perez and Arthur Luiz Piza. In 1978 he returned to Brazil and realized various works of public art, such as the Monument to the basic sanitation of Fortaleza (1977/1978), on the beach of Náutico, the panel in the Legislative Assembly of Fortaleza, Monument to the Jangadeiro (1992), in Fortaleza, among others. Throughout these years he participated in several exhibitions in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia, Fortaleza, São Luís (AMARAL, 2011). Over the first two decades of the 21st century, Sérvulo Esmeraldo participated in several solo exhibitions in Brazil and Europe. In São Paulo with his retrospective exhibition at the Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, in 2011; at Galeria Raquel Arnaud, in 2012, entitled Simples como o triângulo and at the Instituto de Arte Contemporânea - IAC, in 2014, entitled O arquivo vivo de Sérvulo Esmeraldo. In 2013 at Pinakotheke Cultural, in the city of Rio de Janeiro; in 2016 in his hometown entitled A linha, a luz, o Crato and in 2017, the year of his death, at Beurret & Bailly Auktionen, in Basel, Switzerland. Whether it be drawings, sculptures or engravings, throughout his life Sérvulo Esmeraldo gave continuity to his work, producing over the years a vast artistic and archival material. Part of this material, mainly the period when he lived in Europe, has been safeguarded and available for research at the Institute of Contemporary Art since 2014.

Por: Sala Galeria