Exhibition "São Paulo, sua, nossa Pauliceia Desvairada, by José De Quadros

Close to the anniversary of the capital of São Paulo, the centennial of the Week of Modern Art of 1922, and the bicentennial of Brazil's Independence, the gallery Arte132 presents São Paulo, yours, our Pauliceia Desvairada José De Quadros' solo show, on view from Saturday, January 22, 2022. The show shows the reality of the capital far from the elites and emphasizes its pluralities, with works full of elements that refer to the periphery and the surroundings of the artist's studio, located in Itaim Paulista, on the eastern edge of the city.

 

Through paintings and drawings, José highlights the minutiae of daily life, popular architecture, clotheslines, television antennas and high tension wires, an allusion to social, political and cultural issues. There are 40 works on show, which invite the visitor to get to know São Paulo through the narrative of those who are really part of São Paulo's diversity. The title of the exhibition, inspired in the work Pauliceia Desvairadaby Mario de Andrade, proposes a widening of the view of the São Paulo capital. "Modernism spoke of and portrayed the centre of São Paulo. Not the periphery, it was forgotten. José De Quadros seeks other elements and proposes a horizontal dialogue about the city of São Paulo, which is seen in the series Atelier of São Paulo", explains curator Tereza de Arruda.

 

"The contemporary artist does not live from an idyllic and fictitious environment, but from the reality that is imposed upon him. In the case of José De Quadros, these characteristics are striking, as he lives with the discrepancies of Pauliceia, as he lives on the outskirts of São Paulo, transposing in his works part of this universe in an act of interlocution, insertion and visibility of his surroundings, which make up the plurality of this deranged city," adds Tereza.

 

Moments, perspectives and events are the central themes of his works, nourished by observation and listening. José De Quadros seeks to interpret and materialize with attention and, at the same time, without being invasive, the situations of everyday life, assimilating and documenting what is around him. The portraits are also means he uses to capture testimonies of his personal intimacy and of his investigation into the other. In the series of portraits of indigenous people entitled Selk'Namfor example, he pays homage to a forgotten minority. 

 

Selk'nam was the name of an ethnic group that lived in the Patagonian region of southern Argentina and Chile, including the Tierra del Fuego islands, until the first half of the 20th century. From 1878, there was a genocide as a consequence of the colonisation of the island by gold prospectors and sheep farmers, causing the complete extinction of this ethnic group. In the representations created by the artist, their posture and body ornaments stand out, with gold as an attribute reminding of the greed that caused their extinction.

 

"Throughout the history of art, several artists have made works referring to their studios, always showing them in a romantic or mythical way. When I approach the theme studio, I do not show what is obvious for a painter, which would be brushes, palettes, easels etc, but rather what is around, stripped of any romanticism or mythicism. Everything is interpreted with a certain dryness, revealing the place as a mere work space, like any other. In a certain way, the banal things portrayed (ladder, window, chair, table) acquire another sense when shown in this context and come to have a superior value, detached from our normal vision of everyday life", declares José.

 

Born in 1958, in Barretos (SP), the artist started his journey as an autodidact still in Brazil. He lived in Itaim Paulista for years and a long path led him to Germany, where he entered the Kassel Art Academy, graduating in 1998 with a specialization in Painting with Prof. Kurt Haug. Both cities where he lives, both São Paulo and Kassel, host two of the most important art exhibitions - the São Paulo Biennial and the Kassel Documenta. A frequent visitor to these contexts, José De Quadros has always quenched his thirst, through his curious eye and acute sensitivity, for the universe of contemporary national and international art. Still in these contexts, he was assistant to Anselm Kiefer, Cildo Meireles and Tunga, among others.

 

As he has also lived in Germany for some time, the socio-political and cultural evolution of this country is also the subject of his works. In the exhibition, original newspapers from the Nazi period are presented in the series called Times for Drawing. On them, the artist paints insects and other animals that represent the plague to spread in their surroundings, a powerful reference to an imminent ideological danger. This work, simultaneously critical and vigilant, gives us a new perspective of the social sphere during the period of Nazism, when all citizens who did not meet a pre-established standard were destined for extermination. According to José De Quadros: "The drawings and overpainting veil the great tragedy that hides behind. Thus veiled, they become mysterious and arouse curiosity: what really happened? Perhaps that is the great advantage of this work: to destroy something in order to build something new".

 

"Moving between painting and drawing, both in different techniques and supports, José de Quadros is an artist of the studio, understood as the territory of creative exercise, who throughout his work draws inspiration from and dialogues empathically with characters and historical-social issues related to his personal experiences," concludes curator Tereza de Arruda.

 

Arte132 exhibits, supports and keeps in its collection recognized Brazilian artists, especially their lesser known authorial production, artists who developed an understanding of the world and of mankind in some moment. Its exhibitions always have the commitment to present relevant art of quality to as many people as possible, collectors or not. The house (designed by the architect Fernando Malheiros de Miranda in 1972), besides being an art gallery, is a place for encounters and discoveries.

 

Curator: Tereza de Arruda

Venue: Arte132

Address: Av. Juriti, 132, Moema, São Paulo

Opening: Saturday 22 January, from 11am to 5pm

Exhibition period: from 22 January to 05 March 2022

Visiting hours: Monday to Friday, from 2pm to 7pm. Saturdays, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

On 12 February, at 3pm, there will be a guided tour by curator Tereza de Arruda

Free entry

https://arte132.com.br