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COMIT EDITORIAL
Blanca Brites
Maria Amelia Bulhes
Paulo Silveira
Sandra Rey
Editorao
Pedro Biz
ASSINATURAS E PERMUTAS
PROGRAMA DE PS-GRADUAO EM ARTES VISUAIS INSTITUTO DE ARTES UFRGS
Rua Senhor dos Passos, 248 3 andar CEP 90.020-180 Porto Alegre, RS Brasil
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EDITORIAL
O Dossi da revista Porto Arte nmero Porto Artes 31 issues dossier, organized
31, organizado por Icleia Cattani, tem by Icleia Cattani, has been christened
como ttulo Pintura contempornea: campos Contemporary Painting: processes and fields.
e processos. Os campos da pintura so The fields of painting are currently and
atualmente objeto de reflexo recorrente, recurringly an object of reflection, given
devido sua ampliao e presena de its broadening and the presence of an
um fora do campo que parte da prpria out-of-field matter that comes from
linguagem pictrica. A organizadora, que pictorial language itself. The organizer,
coordena grupo de pesquisa apoiado pelo who coordinates the research group in
CNPq nesta temtica, prope um conjunto this area supported by CNPq, proposes
de reflexes que abrangem artigos nas an ensemble of reflections that comprise
reas de Histria, teoria e critica da arte e de articles pertaining to the ares of history, art
Poticas visuais. theory and critic and visual poetics.
Na primeira rea, o texto de Gustavo In the first area, Gustavo Faress text
Fares dialoga diretamente com aquele j dialogues directly with the classic one by
clssico de Rosalind Krauss, A escultura no Rosalind Krauss, Sculpture in the expanded
campo expandido, discutindo a metodologia field, discussing the authors methodology
da autora para a pintura e propondo for painting and proposing conceptual
desdobramentos conceituais. Michael unfoldings. Michael Asbury and Icleia Cattani
Asbury e Icleia Cattani trazem a discusso bring a discussion of fields and processes of
dos campos e processos da pintura contemporary painting to the analysis of the
contempornea para a anlise de obras specifis works of two renowed artists in the
especficas de dois artistas reconhecidos no national scene, respectively Daniel Senise and
cenrio nacional, respectivamente, Daniel Karin Lambrecht.
Senise e Karin Lambrecht. In the area of visual poetics, liane
Na rea de poticas visuais, liane Chiron transposes pictorial questions into
Chiron transpe questes pictricas para the digital video, overall by isolating images
o vdeo digital, sobretudo ao isolar imagens from it, in saturated colors, and putting them
deste, de cor saturada, e desloc-las para into bidimensional pillars. Simultaneously, she
suportes bidimensionais. Ela trabalha works with the concept of the intimate in art.
simultaneamente com o conceito de ntimo For Carlos Zilio, to choose for the support
na arte. Para Carlos Zilio, optar pelo of painting meant to understand its potential
suporte da pintura significava compreender as a theoretical field. With its crisis, painting
seu potencial como campo terico. Com a should be thought upon, which brought him
sua crise, a pintura deveria ser colocada em to paint painting. For Paulo Pasta, painting
causa, o que o levou a pintar a pintura. Para has always been, also, a self-discover, being a
Paulo Pasta, a pintura sempre foi, tambm, very close activity to his own life, which made
auto descoberta, sendo uma atividade him attempt to build some distance between
muito rente prpria vida, o que o faz desire and project. Ricardo Perufo Mello
tentar construir uma distncia entre desejo approaches changes in image, among which its
e projeto. Ricardo Perufo Mello aborda rarefication through the action of time, when
as mudanas da imagem, entre as quais a transposed from video to painting.
sua rarefao pela ao do tempo, quando In this issue we also bring an article
transposta do vdeo pintura. by Nestor Garcia Canclini about the 8th
Contamos ainda neste nmero com Visual Arts Mercosul Biennial and another
um artigo de Nestor Garcia Canclini sobre by Artur Freitas on the pictorial work of
a 8 edio da Bienal de Artes Visuais do Miguel Bakun. In the Reviews section, we
Mercosul e outro de Artur Freitas sobre a present commentaries on the book Paisagem:
obra pictrica de Miguel Bakun. Na seo desdobramentos e perspectivas contemporneas
Resenha apresentamos comentrios sobre o (Scenery, unfoldings and contemporary
livro Paisagem: desdobramentos e perspectivas perspectives) by Antonio Vargas.
contemporneas, escrita por Antonio Vargas.
SUMRIO
07 GUSTAVO FARES
Pintura no campo expandido
17 ICLEIA CATTANI
Poitica, matria, campos nas pinturas de Karin Lambrecht
31 MICHAEL ASBURY
Daniel Senise, 2892: entre o ser e o nada, o espectador
41 LIANE CHIRON
ntima mutao da pintura no vdeo digital
55 CARLOS ZILIO
A pintura como indagao
63 PAULO PASTA
Dentro e fora da pintura
73 RICARDO PERUFO MELLO
Rarefao: paradoxos imagticos (mestiagens contidas na potica
pictrica de uma imagem videogrfica rarefeita)
TEXTOS
81 NSTOR GARCA CANCLINI
A bienal da desglobalizao
87 ARTUR FREITAS
A natureza dispersa: Miguel Bakun
NOTAS DE LEITURA
105 ANTONIO VARGAS
Paisagem: desdobramentos e perspectivas contemporneas, Maria
Amelia Bulhes e Maria Lcia Bastos Kern, Organizadoras
CADERNO DE VERSES
113 ENGLISH
157 FRANAIS
165 ESPAOL
DOSSI
GUSTAVO FARES
RESUMO
O presente ensaio questiona e ao mesmo
tempo reconhece as condies histricas
e lgicas da existncia da pintura como
um campo expandido. O campo expandido
da pintura apresentado atravs de um
retngulo de Greimas, o qual incorpora as
noes de singularidade / reprodutibilidade,
multidimensionais espaos afins e histria.
O ensaio oferece uma compreenso da
disciplina e das obras de arte e torna possvel
situar diferentes manifestaes artsticas que
ocorrem hoje na sociedade.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Pintura. Pluralismo. Krauss. Greimas. Campo
expandido.
8 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
O mundo da arte de hoje pode ser caracterizado por aquilo que, por falta
de termo melhor, chamado de pluralismo. O termo pluralismo designa, pelo
menos, duas diferentes tendncias. Por um lado, ele sinaliza o fato de que no h
estilos de arte dominantes em nossos dias e que continuar a procurar uma linguagem
pura em qualquer meio visual pode tornar-se uma tarefa infrutfera. Por outro lado,
pluralismo tambm usado para descrever uma atitude de vale tudo que deixa
as preocupaes com a qualidade de lado em favor de um tipo de tolerncia que
tudo aceita como igualmente vlido.
Arthur C. Danto prope uma primeira compreenso do termo pluralismo
como sendo o resultado das mudanas no mundo da arte desde os anos 1960. Na
sua opinio, a partir desta dcada, a crise da arte-objeto assumiu amplo poder de
disseminao. Este foi para Danto, sobretudo no caso da obra de Andy Warhol, o
que tornou evidente o problema com/da arte. Esse problema no outro seno o
de distinguir o objeto de arte dos objetos-do-mundo. Quando o objeto artstico
veio a ser considerado nem superior nem inferior a objetos no mundo real, mas
prximo demais a eles para permitir uma distino visual (ready-mades de Duchamp
ou Brillo boxes de Warhol), a diferena entre um objeto de arte e um objeto-do-
mundo escapou da esfera da esttica, e da arte em geral, para se tornar um problema
Publicado originalmente em Janus
filosfico. Era como se a arte tivesse chegado compreenso de sua prpria essncia,
Head: Journal of Interdisciplinary
Studies in Literature, Continental Phi- o conhecimento pela arte de o que arte e, ao faz-lo, tivesse chegado a uma
losophy, Phenomenological Psychology, espcie de encerramento (Danto,Transfiguration, p. 107).1 A arte adentrou, ento,
and the Arts, v. 7, n. 2, p. 477-487,
inverno de 2004, Trivium Publications,
um estgio que pode ser chamado de ps-histrico ou ps-moderno, uma fase que
Amherst (Estados Unidos). parecia libertar o artista e o objeto de arte das funes que foram convencionadas
a eles at aquele momento.
1 O segundo significado de pluralismo, como vale tudo, caracteriza uma
Danto prope que um desenvolvimen- falha por parte do artista, do crtico, e do mundo da arte em geral em engajar-se
to semelhante ocorre na esttica de
seriamente com o tema em questo, ou seja, a arte, a fim de faz-la desempenhar
Hegel, onde a arte um instrumento
para a plena manifestao do esprito um papel relevante nos debates culturais de hoje. Esta segunda compreenso de
e, uma vez que o esprito atingiu esse pluralismo torna-se abertamente poltica quando se trata de identidade nacional
objetivo, como no caso do modernis-
mo, a arte perde seu objetivo, que
versus internacional a partir de uma perspectiva cultural globalizada. Em tal esfera
retomado pela reflexo filosfica. cultural a tendncia hegemnica do pluralismo pode ser interpretada como esperando
GUSTAVO FARES, Pintura no campo expandido 9
DOSSI
formas ocidentais de expresso, quanto com um certo exotismo, que transforma as
artes visuais de culturas que sejam diferentes das nossas em um empreendimento
antropolgico (Foster, 55). Em outras palavras, tal pluralismo espera o primeiro-
mundo ocidental produzir arte e teoria, enquanto o resto do mundo se torna uma
provncia a qual, na melhor das hipteses, produza arte e teoria limitadas s suas
prprias esferas nacionais e, na pior das hipteses, oferea materiais culturais (brutos)
para serem mais tarde processados no primeiro-mundo, onde valores acadmicos/
culturais so adicionados.
Pluralismo, em ambos os sentidos do termo, como uma variedade de estilos
disponveis, bem como um vale tudo e atitude neo-colonialista, tem sido reconhecido
como uma tendncia hegemnica cultural, e acredito que seja precisamente isso, uma
tendncia hegemnica cultural, no uma conjuntura natural e a-histrica. Crticos como
Hal Foster e Fredric Jameson identificaram isto, aparentemente, livre de tendncia de
fatores histricos e sociais como a lgica cultural do capitalismo tardio (Jameson), uma
lgica baseada nos meios de produo (cultural) exportada do Ocidente para outras
latitudes (Foster). Robert Morgan, por sua vez, reconhece a presena do pluralismo
no mundo da arte e prope uma forma de diferenciar um tipo sintomtico de arte
de outro que ele chama de significante. O primeiro uma espcie de espetculo no
sentido dado ao termo por Guy Debord, um evento relacionado a um mundo fashion
ao invs de artstico, intimamente associado com a compreenso neo-colonialista de
pluralismo. Em contraste com o espetculo, o tipo de arte o qual significante
tende a ser mais ntimo, bem como associado a uma ideia eficazmente pensada
[powerfully thought idea] (Morgan, 96), a qual pode ser expressa por uma variedade
de estilos e formas. Alm disso, uma arte significante pode tambm apresentar a
possibilidade de incorporar um lugar de resistncia contra a noo de que toda cultura
predeterminada e carece de originalidade, e que , desse modo, intercambivel e
necessariamente efmera.
A mirade de estilos e objetos que povoam o mundo da arte, juntamente com
a tendncia que aceita tudo como vlido e predeterminado, em outras palavras
pluralismo, tm dado a muitos uma pausa crtica e impelido-o/a a declarar que a
arte acabou, mesmo morta.
Dentro desta perspectiva bastante sombria, quase nenhuma outra disciplina
tem sofrido tanta suspeita e crtica negativa quanto a pintura, especialmente nos
ltimos vinte anos. Considerando que tido como certo que a arte em geral, e a
pintura em particular, no gozam mais a ampla ressonncia cultural que tiveram por
400 anos ou mais, esta constatao, no entanto, no implica necessariamente uma
vez que quase ningum est prestando ateno em que toda a iniciativa deva ficar
margem do caminho.
10 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
ps-modernista [post-modernistic]. Como tal, ele tenta negar suas condies histricas,
ao mesmo tempo em que toma a histria por runa, um campo a ser escavado e usado
como se as opes oferecidas e tomadas no foram conseqncias outras seno
da esttica. Pluralismo outra palavra para esta negao. Em oposio iluso de
permanecer alm da histria, Jameson l o texto moderno de Conrad revelando as
suas condies de existncia, seu fundamento histrico e social e o que reprimido
e/ou ocultado pelo texto.4
Os opostos bipolares organizados pelo retngulo semntico de Greimas que
serviram para Jameson determinar as dimenses lgicas e ideolgicas de um texto
(literrio) so tambm a base para o clssico ensaio de Rosalind Krauss, A escultura
no campo ampliado. Nele, a noo de historicidade aparece uma vez mais como
apareceu na anlise de Jameson como um elemento adicionado ao retngulo
Greimas. Krauss refere-se historicidade no apenas ou nem sequer no sentido
de genealogia ou linhagem, mas como uma prtica de organizao, em seu caso
da escultura, que pode assumir diferentes estgios lgicos ao longo do tempo. Na
escultura, esses diferentes estgios, como Krauss os v, ampliam o conceito da prtica
associada com o monumento, confrontando-a com dois negativos, duas coisas que
a escultura no , uma paisagem e uma construo. Em seu artigo, Krauss identifica
prticas artsticas que colocam em questo o status de escultura como monumento.
Como resultado deste desafio, Krauss prope que a noo de escultura tem se
desenvolvido desde os anos 1960, no s na prtica como tambm em termos lgicos,
para designar reas de atividades artsticas no antes reconhecidas como associadas
com a escultura.Tais reas incluem a land art, marked sites, peas semi-arquitetnicas,
e as obras de artistas to diversos como Nauman, Serra, De Maria, Morris, Smithson,
Irwin ou Le Witt.5
A leitura de Conrad por Jameson e a leitura da escultura por Krauss atravs
da utilizao do Greimas mais histria, revelam as condies de existncia de um
texto e do campo cultural ao qual ele pertence. A questo diante de ns , o que
revelaria esta atitude crtica e auto-consciente quando aplicada ao campo da pintura?
Em outras palavras, com o que se pareceria a pintura no campo expandido? E que 4
conseqncias poderia tal leitura da pintura ter para a compreenso do meio em Para Jameson esta leitura histrica
equivalente ao Real lacaniano, ou
um mundo-da-arte pluralista? seja, para o horizonte que subsumes
De modo a responder a estas perguntas a respeito da pintura, Krauss recomenda o texto e que , como no caso de
o uso das categorias de singularidade/reprodutibilidade como os termos binrios Lacan, no representvel.
uma a outra, mas como os extremos polares do mesmo territrio (realm). Em outras
palavras, eles no so opostos um ao outro porque no tm nada em comum, mas
sim porque singularidade est no outro extremo do espectro da reprodutibilidade.
Ao conceitualizar estes termos como pertencentes a um espectro, estamos aptos a
aceitar e pedir por estgios intermedirios entre estes dois absolutos. Eu realmente
gostaria de usar as dimenses singularidade/reprodutibilidade de Krauss, mas dado que
elas pertencem ao mesmo territrio, ao invs de territrios opostos, eu proponho
incorporar inicialmente um diferente par de termos bipolares ao retngulo Greimas:
tridimensionalidade e movimento, dois aspectos que faltam pintura. Estas duas
caractersticas em suas interaes negativas podem ser organizadas em relao
pintura como segue:
no-movimento no-3D
DOSSI
3D (instalao) movimento (vdeo)
Rauschenberg (impresso/
Stella/ Serra fotografia/
Body art arte digital)
no-movimento no-3D
1. Singularidade / reprodutibilidade
contnuas mudanas e transformaes. Body art, por exemplo, pode ser vista como uma
DOSSI
manifestao artstica isolada, sob pena de separ-la, ainda que por um momento, da
pintura, movimento, e tridimensionalidade, sem mencionar de outras potencialmente
enriquecedoras manifestaes como a dana ou rituais sagrados, manifestaes que
podem ser acomodadas no campo expandido aqui proposto.
3. Histria
termo identificado com uma atitude de vale tudo, mais relacionada ao mundo do
DOSSI
REFERNCIAS
CRARY, Jonathan. Techniques of the observer: on vision and modernity in the nineteenth century.
Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991.
DANTO,Arthur. The philosophical disenfranchisement of art. New York: Columbia University Press, 1986.
FOSTER, Hal. The problem with pluralism. In: LANE, John; CALDWELL, John (Org.). Carnegie
International. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Museum of Art, 1985. p.50-57.
JAMESON, Fredric. The political unconscious: narrative as a socially symbolic act. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1981.
KRAUSS, Rosalind. Sculpture in the expanded field. In: HERTZ, Richard. Theories of contemporary art.
New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1993. p.215-224.
MORGAN, Robert. Duchamp y los artistas contemporneos posmodernos. Buenos Aires: Eudeba, 2000.
RUSH, Michael. New media rampant. Art in America, p. 41- 43, jul. 2000.
STORR, Robert. An interview with Ilya Kabakov. Art in America, p. 60-69/125, jan. 1995.
8
DOSSI
ICLEIA CATTANI
RESUMO
O presente texto tem como fio condutor a
pintura de Karin Lambrecht.Artista de j longa
trajetria, sua obra sempre girou em torno da
pintura para a qual, alm da tinta a leo, utiliza
acrlica com terra e outros pigmentos naturais.
Sua produo contempornea caracteriza-se
tambm por pinturas realizadas com sangue. O
foco da apresentao ser a anlise das relaes
em sua poitica e na potica de seus trabalhos,
entre os materiais empregados e a matria
decorrente nas pinturas, as caractersticas dos
diferentes suportes e como estas questes,
juntas, definem as obras quanto ao seu campo.
Sero utilizados os conceitos de imaginao
material (Bachelard) e de campos especfico,
expandido e fora-do-campo da pintura. A
estes, somam-se os conceitos de fronteiras
e metamorfoses, para dar conta da realidade
complexa das obras e das questes que
emergem da prpria pintura.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Pintura Contempornea. Poitica. Matria.
Material. Campos da pintura. Karin Lambrecht
18 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
DOSSI
meio de rupturas, retomadas, interrupes. No se tratou absolutamente de uma
evoluo, que no existe em arte, mas de mudanas que acompanharam e constituram
as visualidades moderna e contempornea. Na questo do espao houve a substituio
de um espao tridimensional que tenta recriar o visvel, por lugares mltiplos, tensos,
que criam novas condies para a troca de olhares entre a obra e o espectador.
No caso das obras de Karin, trata-se da pintura enquanto elemento real. Na
medida em que o objeto-pintura no apresenta outra coisa seno a si mesmo,
possvel que ele mude de forma, incorpore objetos e substncias do mundo real,
dispense o quadro, expanda-se pelo espao tridimensional. Enquanto corpo no
mundo, a pintura inscreve-se neste reagindo, como qualquer corpo,s mudanas que o
afetam.O espao no mais representado, mas como lugar da pintura enquanto corpo
apresentado passa a ser o espao do mundo real. Assim, nada impede, historicamente,
que a pintura (no o quadro), se torne tridimensional, como veremos na obra de
Karin, que com os trabalhos de sangue chegou instalao, incorporando linguagens
e materiais diversos mas de dentro de um pensamento da pintura.
Este texto prope um breve estudo de obras pontuais dentro de uma ordem
cronolgica, desde os anos 1980 at as instalaes com sangue de 1997 em diante.
Obras que so exemplares de sua poitica, pois evidenciam a importncia da matria
e dos materiais, a abordagem de fronteiras diversas, fsicas e simblicas,a extenso
do campo da pintura at ao fora-do-campo.
importante verificar, rapidamente, a trajetria inicial da artista. Karin formou-
se em pintura nos anos 1970, como estudante no IA-UFRGS. De 1980 a 1983,
estudou na Escola Superior de Arte (HDK) em Berlim, momento decisivo para a sua
formao, quando se dedicou ao conhecimento dos pigmentos e sua manipulao,
uma prtica que mantm at hoje. Experimentou a pintura como exerccio livre
mas envolvendo o conhecimento do material e das formas de abordagem, alm do
questionamento constante sobre o ato de pintar e a reflexo sobre seu significado.
Em 1984, participou da mostra Como vai voc, Gerao 80? no Parque Lage, RJ, da
qual fizeram parte artistas que trabalhavam com diferentes linguagens. Nessa mostra,
sobressaa-se a chamada volta pintura, que constituiu um fenmeno internacional
na dcada. Segundo a artista, a pintura teve um significado particular no Brasil naquele
momento: com o fim da ditadura, havia o desejo de uma arte muito direta, que
envolvesse o corpo, e a pintura permite essa experincia fsica, liberatria.2 No seu
caso, essa vivncia de liberdade coincidiu com o aprendizado em Berlim, levando-a a
experincias pictricas diferenciadas que envolveram em poucos anos, uma grande
quantidade de materiais e uma reflexo sobre a matria da pintura. Esta matria foi 2
Matria / material
DOSSI
Anita Oaba, 1985, faz parte de uma srie de telas que se aproximam do conceito
DOSSI
de bad painting: pintada com esmalte sinttico, mal pintada segundo a artista, ela
correspondeu a um momento em que sentia fortemente o desejo de desafiar os
limites da pintura e de chocar pelas formas criadas. Segundo Miguel Chaia, de 1983
at cerca de 1987, primeira fase de sua pintura aps o retorno da Alemanha, a artista
preocupava-se com a dimenso urbano-industrial que fornecia os resduos da falncia
produtiva e da deteriorao citadina para as suas instalaes e construes (2002, p.
33) Da, o uso de tintas industriais, como em Anita Oaba, e uma proximidade formal
com o neo-expressionismo, que marca a forma e a fatura exacerbadas. Como muitas
pinturas dos anos 1980, esta possui grandes dimenses, acima das do corpo humano,
exigindo da pintora um corpo-a-corpo com a tela; esta questo iria marcar a obra de
Karin na sua seqncia. A pintura para Karin, segundo Marilice Corona, permanncia
e insistncia, como uma arena ou um campo de batalha, pois quando a pintura assume
as dimenses do corpo, h um embate.Trata-se de uma vinculao direta com nossa
existncia e nossa efemeridade.3 A artista, no seguimento de sua obra, mencionou
e escreveu nas telas a expresso in Arena, evidenciando os embates mltiplos com a
figura, com o plano do suporte, com a matria da pintura e, tambm, novos embates
com o que surge destes primeiros, o inconsciente, o sagrado, as pulses e desejos
entre os quais, as pulses de vida e de morte.
Em Sem ttulo,1986, a artista, sob a provocao de uma prtica qual avessa (a
releitura de uma obra do MARGS, dentro do Projeto Releitura do Museu), escolheu
uma obra que mostra um universo ideal, com bebs rosados e uma me amorosa,
e criou em contradio com essa temtica: uma me obscura, apenas perceptvel
contra o fundo da tela, braos abertos, trgica e estilizada ao ponto de se assemelhar
a uma cruz. Nesta pintura, tambm de grandes dimenses, como na maioria que
realizou na poca, tambm fica evidente a aproximao com o Neo-Expressionismo
embora ocorra uma mudana visvel nos pigmentos empregados em relao s obras
anteriores.
Ester ou Ester Entra no Ptio Interior da Casa do Rei, 1987, evidencia as rupturas
que a artista efetuava ento com o universo tradicional da pintura, pela incluso de
elementos tridimensionais no interior da prpria potica pictrica, constituindo-a
juntamente com o suporte tradicional pintado. Assim, desde aquele momento Karin j
operava rupturas com a planaridade do suporte real da pintura, a tela. Esse processo
marcou sua obra desde ento, tanto pela adio de elementos tridimensionais, quanto
pelo deslocamento do suporte da parede para o cho, como ocorre em alguns
trabalhos da poca.
Nesse mesmo momento, a artista passou a realizar pinturas sem chassis, que 3
Vemos por essa definio que, embora Karin tenha-se assumido desde o incio
de sua carreira, como pintora, seu trabalho rapidamente assumiu o caminho dos
desvios experimentais, mencionados por Rhnelt, que constituem em parte o campo
ampliado da pintura. Com o tempo, a artista continuou para alm destes, mas sempre a
partir de uma imaginao material da pintura. O uso do sangue de carneiro provocou
mudanas em sua poitica, levando-a expanso e, finalmente, ao fora-do-campo.
O sangue enquanto matria/material da arte e matria do corpo e da vida,
da ordem do informe (Didi-Huberman, 1995; Krauss e Bois, 1996), a obra que lhe
d forma, o corpo que lhe d um continente. O fluxo desta matria/material, sua
quantidade, fazem tambm parte do informe enquanto excesso, incerteza, acaso. O
sangue define a obra, mais do que a prpria artista e a define enquanto transgresso,
sujeira, descontrole, opostos tradio da pintura, e opostos at mesmo, em parte,
modernidade, pois se o acaso faz parte da arte desde esta ltima, a literalizao dos
elementos componentes da pintura (camadas, reflexos, transparncias etc.) s vm
a ocorrer na contemporaneidade. Materializar o sangue, evidenciar sua densidade,
quantidade e cheiro, procedimento contemporneo e transgressivo. priorizar o
informe no territrio das formas.
Com o sangue sobre as vestes que aparecem como suportes em obras da srie
Registros de Sangue, corpo humano e corpo animal se confundem; o sangue que nelas
se espalha e cria manchas interpretado como sendo sangue humano, daquele/
daquela que utilizou aquela roupa especfica. A informao de que se trata de sangue
animal fornecida aos espectadores nas especificaes tcnicas de cada trabalho.
Todavia, a fora da evocao do corpo humano pelo suporte conotado permanece,
gerando questionamentos: at que ponto nos diferenciamos dos animais e da natureza,
principalmente na morte? Nestes trabalhos de Karin, a matria induz tantas ou mais
reflexes do que o informe das formas.
ICLEIA CATTANI, Poitica, Matria, Campos nas pinturas de Karin Lambrecht 1 23
Campos
DOSSI
O campo, ou os campos da pintura, so outra questo substantiva no trabalho
da artista. Segundo Victor Stoichita, todo quadro, mesmo que seja no-representativo,
no-ilusionista, uma negao da parede. (1993, p.38). Mas a pintura que escapa
parede, que invade o espao tridimensional, deixa de ser pintura ou deixa apenas
de ser quadro? At que ponto os campos da pintura limitam-se a este ltimo? Na
modernidade, segundo de Mredieu, a pintura criou toda sorte de inovaes dentro
do suporte, como a extraordinria inveno das colagens e das palavras escritas no
espao do quadro, mas no rompeu com este (2004). A linguagem expandiu-se nos
materiais, mas dentro dos limites tradicionais do chassi. na contemporaneidade, se
a considerarmos a partir dos anos 1960,4 que a pintura comea a invadir o espao
tridimensional, rompendo suas fronteiras e ampliando seu campo.
Pode-se dizer a partir destas consideraes, que campo do quadro e campo da
pintura so duas questes complementares mas distintas. O que constitui o campo
especfico de uma obra de pintura seu campo interno mas no os limites ou formas
do seu suporte; o campo ampliado refere-se ao que o expande, mas de dentro de um
pensamento pictrico; o fora-do-campo da pintura seria o que a projeta para alm
de seus prprios limites.
Na arte contempornea, isto ocorre a partir de um cruzamento de questes da
pintura com pensamentos, matrias, formas e prticas que vm de outras reas das
artes visuais, desde outras linguagens tradicionais como desenho, gravura, escultura
at fotografia, cinema, performance, instalao, novas tecnologias e tambm, de outras
reas do saber como antropologia, histria, filosofia, literatura.
As obras de Karin avanam em algumas destas direes, criando descontinuidades.
Estas podem ser pensadas a partir de mais de um conceito e de prticas interligados,
como limiar, fronteira, migrao, mutao, metamorfose, substantivos em seus
trabalhos. Eles so permeveis, mveis e afetam a totalidade da pintura, que existe
enquanto lugar e enquanto corpo. Karin tambm explora a memria deste, nomeando
muitas vezes suas partes como se dessa nomeao nascesse o sentido. Fluxo, sangue,
circulao, alm de nomes de partes do corpo como rins, pulmes, corao, esto
presentes em suas pinturas desde antes de seus trabalhos com sangue. A artista
no hesita em relao a estes corpos criados ou recriados em suas pinturas, em
metamorfose-los em corpos pictricos que assumem uma tridimensionalidade
parcial ou total, atravs de elementos agregados tela ou pelo fato desta assumir a
forma de um volume, solto no cho. Ela muitas vezes substitui os suportes tradicionais 4
por panos soltos e outros materiais; este procedimento, sistemtico, sem dvida o Trata-se do mesmo momento em
que Rosalind Krauss constata e
mais significativo para o encaminhamento de sua obra, de um campo ampliado, a um analisa a ampliao do campo da
fora-do-campo da pintura. Mas os suportes e sua posio no espao so intimamente escultura (1984).
24 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
como o carneiro por meio do seu sangue, as marcas das mos da artista indicaro
sua presena mesmo aps seu desaparecimento.
A prtica de realizar desenhos juntamente com as pinturas em sangue prosseguiu
em vrios trabalhos. Nestes a artista solicitava aos acompanhantes que imprimissem
rgos do animal nas folhas de papel e ali escrevessem os nomes destes. Trata-se de
um novo modo de evocar partes do corpo, o que j realizava em pinturas anteriores
escrevendo sobre as mesmas. Os trabalhos com sangue ampliaram portanto o campo
de suas pinturas, mas mantendo e expandindo uma lgica interna j existente na obra.
Em Alvo, 1999, o desenho prvio desta forma, feito com cera, revela-se sob o sangue
derramado, representando o lugar da ao e substituindo as palavras in Arena. O lugar
da pintura o lugar da luta, do embate e, talvez, do sacrifcio. O sangue presente nesta
pintura evoca, no apenas as pulses de vida e morte mas tambm a histria violenta
do Brasil e, neste, do Rio Grande do Sul (ela refere-se diretamente s degolas, como
presentes simbolicamente, evocadas e exorcizadas nos trabalhos com sangue); e a
histria da Amrica Latina, principalmente em seu Cone Sul. Alvo pode ser tambm,
aquele corpo que foi morto nas lutas pela defesa dos territrios, ou o animal que se
caava para comer. Pois estes trabalhos trazem outra conotao que ressignificar
a relao das pessoas com os alimentos e, conseqentemente, com a terra, com a
vida, para alm da abstrao dos pacotes asspticos comprados nos supermercados.
Para desalien-las dos seus prprios corpos, enfim, e da relao destes com a morte.
Seremos, ns tambm, alvos? A pintora instaura um dilogo tenso entre estas questes,
seu prprio corpo e suas interrogaes sobre suas origens e seu lugar no mundo.
A obra Linha de Sangue merece ser vista mais detalhadamente.
Um pano colocado sob um carneiro, morto maneira tradicional do Rio Grande
do Sul, ou seja, perfurado no pescoo e pendurado de cabea para baixo para que o
sangue escorra e, com ele, se v a vida.
A artista puxa lentamente esse pano, recolhendo o sangue em forma de linha,
linha de tempo e linha de vida.
Ela cuida para que esta fique relativamente centrada; cuida, tambm, para que
ela termine mais ou menos mesma distncia em que comeou, ou seja, a 50 cm da
borda do pano para isso, ela acelera ou diminui o ritmo de pux-lo, conforme a
fora do jorro: mais rpido no incio, mais lento no final.
Quando concluda, a obra apresenta-se como uma linha, com respingos, que
escurece com o tempo, centrada na altura e atingindo os 12 metros de comprimento
da lona branca, no-preparada, com uma palavra escrita de cada lado, no espao vazio.
Para alm desta aparente simplicidade, inmeras questes aparecem e dizem
respeito poitica da artista e instaurao da obra, relao tempo-espao e
importncia da matria na constituio do lugar dessa pintura.
26 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
A lona foi deixada trs meses ao ar livre, para retirar a goma. Durante esse
DOSSI
tempo, a chuva, os ventos, as plantas e pssaros passaram sobre ela, deixando marcas
que aparecem como palimpsestos, no final. Esse procedimento no novo na obra da
artista; no entanto, ele ressignificado pela presena do sangue, matria viva, sensvel,
sobre um suporte j sensibilizado pela natureza, pelo tempo, pela espera. A tela sendo
puxada durante a perda do sangue pelo carneiro, tambm relaciona-se ao tempo. A
obra se instaura nesse decorrer, da primeira ltima gota, da passagem do ser vivo
carcaa morta. Com a ltima gota de sangue, a obra est pronta. A artista recolhe
e acolhe esse material, fazendo de seu gesto um ato de pintura.
O olhar do espectador tambm necessitar de um tempo para cumprir a
trajetria dessa linha sobre os 12 metros de tela, um percurso que, conforme a
proximidade da pintura, ter que ser acompanhado pelo deslocamento real do corpo.
O lugar da matria o plano, a lona que desempenha simbolicamente um papel
de sudrio, depositria da substncia sagrada recolhida da morte. Esse lugar opaco,
sem profundidade desenrola-se no tempo e na superfcie, trazendo para esta as
questes mais profundas do ser humano, a vida e a morte, confirmando o dito de
Paul Valry, que o mais profundo, a pele.
Karin envolve profundamente o prprio corpo na sua poitica, o que corresponde
ao que denomina a pintura como puro processo que , na verdade, uma relao
fenomenolgica com o ato de pintar. Emerge em seu trabalho um pensamento com e
sobre a matria, o que a leva a declarar que a pintura sempre uma experincia abstrata,
mesmo quando figurativa, pois a matria que a conduz. Do mesmo modo, numa
apropriao irreligiosa de figuras do cristianismo, utiliza-as em suas obras presentes,
mais como aluses do que como formas. Percebe o sangue como sombra da vtima, seja
esta o carneiro sacrificado ou o peo que o sangra dentro de uma prtica ritual, laica,
tradicional e imutvel e, como a percebe a artista, de empatia e respeito, quase mstica.
O pensamento do limiar que orienta sua obra levou-a tambm a trabalhar
concretamente com o conceito de fronteiras. Num primeiro projeto planejou viajar
Argentina, Uruguai e Chile, recolhendo terras das diversas regies de fronteiras e
utilizando-as como material da pintura. Mais tarde, acompanhou a morte de carneiros,
realizadas de modos diferenciados em fazendas destas mesmas regies, para novos
trabalhos de sangue como nas obras que sero vistas a seguir.
Para Karin, a transgresso de limites d-se no interior dessa linguagem e ao
mesmo tempo alarga-a a novas significaes, como quando, em obras dos anos 2000,
comeou a inserir os trabalhos com sangue em instalaes com outros elementos,
como fotografias. No entanto, mesmo esses trabalhos tridimensionais so norteados
pela pintura. Sua obra possui grande radicalidade, na dualidade respeito/transgresso
aos limites da prpria linguagem pictrica, que constitui sempre o seu eixo. Veja-se
a instalao Sem ttulo, 2001.
ICLEIA CATTANI, Poitica, Matria, Campos nas pinturas de Karin Lambrecht 1 27
DOSSI
crua, que cria um pequeno degrau em relao quele. No interior deste territrio h
depresses formando cruzes, nas quais se encaixam telas sem chassis com o mesmo
formato, parcialmente embebidas de sangue. Sobre o estrado h uma estrutura,
feita de toras de madeira de cor mais escura, formando um retngulo vazado cujo
limite superior estende-se horizontalmente, esquerda e direita. Sobre este limiar
superior da forma diferente dos outros lados, esto pendurados quatro aventais
dos quais trs deles so manchados de sangue, o quarto permanece impoluto; dois
esto nos braos que ultrapassam os limites do retngulo, e os outros dois dentro
deste.Todo este conjunto encontra-se no meio do espao, afastado da parede; nesta
ltima, por trs de um dos vestidos, pende uma enorme fotografia em preto e branco
composta por duas mos das quais se v os punhos vestidos de preto, segurando
uma das vsceras do mesmo animal abatido. Impresses de vsceras do animal sobre
papel completam a instalao.
Na obra de Karin, neste momento, a pintura abandona definitivamente seu campo
especfico, matria, suporte, parede, unicidade para jogar-se no mundo, agregando
junto a si, elementos de fora do campo como fotografia, escultura (da qual o cho
de madeira pode funcionar como o suporte) e desenho. Os receptculos da pintura
propriamente dita so tambm no convencionais como cruzes e vestimentas; estas
ltimas, objetos tridimensionais que podem ser observadas por todos os lados. O
que se tem, ento, uma instalao, um fora-do-campo da pintura. No entanto, pela
prpria lgica da trajetria da artista, pode-se constatar que ele guiado por um
pensamento oriundo de e sobre a pintura. Um fora-do-campo no qual a pintura
presena, guia e potncia.
As vestes passaram, a partir desta obra, a fazer parte dos suportes de suas
pinturas de sangue somando-se s fotografias, que representam muitas vezes pessoas
vestindo-as; algumas seriam elementos de instalao. Outras obras seguiram-se como
Con el alma en un hilo (2003) e Caixa de Primeiro Socorro (2005), que sero vistas a seguir.
Uma anlise do papel especfico das vestes neste conjunto de obras foi realizada
por Viviane Gil que afirma que a artista investiu sobre a figura feminina paramentos
manchados de sangue como quem conta uma histria at ento oculta, mas necessria
para completar sua fala de artista, desafiando a desvendar personagens mticos
intrnsecos prpria poitica da obra (2007, p. 190).
Para esta autora, as vestes, que denomina paramentos, so anacrnicas, pois
evocam multiplicidade de tempos e so conotadas de modos diversos, podendo
ser interpretadas de modos diversos, como vestes tradicionais femininas (aventais,
camisolas), como uniformes eclesisticos (de onde vem o termo paramentos), como
vestimentas hospitalares, utilizadas por doentes.Todas elas, roupas desvinculadas das
modas, do tempo histrico, das subjetividades.
28 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Com as vestes, vazias ou vestidas por algum e, quando vestidas, presentes nas
DOSSI
DOSSI
Paipasso, denunciando origens mltiplas, catlica e indgena (apud Gil, 2007, p. 185). Ela
situa-se em duplas fronteiras, de dois municpios gachos e do Brasil com o Uruguai.
Mltiplos limiares, pois, da veste com o corpo, deste com a paisagem, dos espaos
geopolticos entre si, da fotografia como evocao da pintura.
Do lado direito da foto, para onde o corpo se volta como que os indicando,
esto quatro desenhos do mesmo formato daquela, realizados com o mesmo sangue.
A matria, o informe das manchas remetem veste e opem-se definio da figura.
Polptico com sentidos mltiplos, que em tudo evoca a pintura embora esta esteja
ausente.
Caixa do primeiro socorro (2005), mostra a mesma jovem mulher, de p, frente a
uma paisagem similar foto anterior mas, desta vez, trata-se de uma foto realizada
em outra fazenda, no Uruguai. Novamente, o pensamento sobre as fronteiras faz-se
presente na obra, materializado na poitica da artista, no lugar da ao.
O corpo da jovem mulher tambm sofreu metamorfoses, ao mudar de espao.
A fragilidade aparente da figura anterior desapareceu, dando lugar a uma imagem
arquetpica, imponente, aparentemente monumental, vestida com uma roupa escura
(esta sim, similar a um paramento). Seu corpo est em posio frontal: a cabea pende
levemente para o lado e para baixo, como que indicando, novamente, o sangue nas
vestes mas, sobre a roupa escura, a mancha fica menos evidente. Trata-se de uma
obra composta de quatro conjuntos, separados entre si. O que compreende a foto,
de grandes dimenses, traz ao lado quatro desenhos com sangue, apresentados
verticalmente, sendo que o da extremidade superior sobre fundo escuro como a
veste, diferenciando-se dos demais. frente da foto, estende-se uma longa tbua, leito
ou cadafalso. Nos trs outros conjuntos, no lugar da foto pendem soltos grandes
panos manchados de sangue e, ao lado, os desenhos.Trabalho nico/mltiplo, junto
parede mas invadindo o espao tridimensional, misturando suportes, linguagens, tipos
de pensamento: trabalho mestio, dentro-fora do campo da pintura, nos seus limiares.
A declarao de Karin j mencionada, que a pintura, em seu caso, puro processo,
pe frente e evidencia a importncia da poitica. Sua pintura, efetivamente, guiada
por suas condutas criadoras, que vo alm do corpo-a-corpo com a mesma. Suas
motivaes e escolhas prvias (materiais, suportes, modos de trabalhar, temticas
das obras quando estas existem, como por exemplo, o grande nmero de trabalhos
com personagens bblicos), definem o processo, o corpo-a-corpo que ocorre
posteriormente. Ele tambm fundamental, no s na obra criada, mas na pintura
em-se-fazendo, em sua instaurao. Esta evidencia como poucas, na arte brasileira,
o embate entre desmedida e equilbrio, entre espessura e diafaneidade, entre
matria e material, entre suporte e corpo da pintura e finalmente, entre o campo
especfico desta e sua expanso e insero num fora-do-campo, mas de dentro de
30 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
REFERNCIAS
CHAIA, Miguel. Karin Lambrecht: arte, natureza e sociedade. In: Karin Lambrecht. Porto Alegre:
MARGS, 2002.
DIDI-HUBERMAN, Georges. LEmpreinte. Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou, 1997.
DIDI-HUBERMAN, Georges. La ressemblance informe ou Le gai savoir selon Georges Bataille. Paris:
Macula, 1995.
FABRIS, Annateresa. Pesquisa em Artes Visuais. Porto Arte: revista do Instituto de Artes, Universidade
Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, v. 2, n. 4, nov. 1991.
GIL, Viviane. As vestes na srie Registros de Sangue de Karin Lambrecht. In: CATTANI, Icleia.
Mestiagens na arte contempornea. Porto Alegre: PPGAV/UFRGS e Editora da UFRGS, 2007.
KRAUSS, Rosalind. A Escultura no campo ampliado. Revista Gvea, n. 1, 1984.
KRAUSS, Rosalind; BOIS,Yve-Alain. LInforme. Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou, 1996.
MREDIEU, Florence de. Histoire matrielle et immatrielle de lart moderne et contemporain. Paris:
Larousse, 2004.
PASSERON, Ren. Pour une philosophie de la cration. Paris: Klincksieck, 1989.
RHNELT, Mrio. Pintura: da matria representao.Viamo: Fundao Vera Chaves Barcellos, 2011.
(Catlogo de exposio.)
SOICHITA, Victor. Linstauration du tableau: mtapeinture laube des temps modernes. Paris,
Klincksieck, 1993.
TEYSSEDRE, Bernard. Bachelard et lImagination matrielle en peinture. In: REVAULT DALLONES,
Olivier. LOeuvre et le concept. Paris: Klincksieck, 1992.
DOSSI
MICHAEL ASBURY
RESUMO
Este ensaio investiga e especula sobre alguns
contextos possveis da instalao 2892 de
Daniel Senise. Ele investiga a relao entre 2892
e certas pinturas do artista atravs de uma
breve historiografia de sua trajetria, e especula
sobre aspectos ontolgicos ao qual conceitos
oriundos de 2892 podem se referir. Ele termina
por discutir 2892 como um possvel incio da
preocupao do artista com a arquitetura e
sua simbologia.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Marcel Duchamp. Readymade. Sartre. O
Ser e o Outro. O Sudrio. Barroco. Neo-
clacissismo.
32 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
Em 1992 Daniel Senise iniciava um processo de pintura que definiria sua prtica
pelas prximas dcadas. Em sua pintura o Retrato da Me do Artista (1992) a silhueta
de uma figura sentada pode ser percebida atravs da aglomerao de marcas de ferro
oxidado; uma vaga sombra ao fundo suavemente enfatiza o tema da obra, fazendo
sentido pictrico em meio a aparente aleatoriedade dos traos de pregos.
Uma outra pintura produzida naquele mesmo ano carrega o mesmo ttulo.
Apenas levemente menor em sua dimenso, a pintura parece retratar uma figura
sentada e recoberta por um lenol (um sudrio talvez), naquilo que agora aparenta
ser um quarto escuro e vazio, como se tivesse acabado de falecer.
No prximo ano uma semelhante figura sentada aparece com sua imagem
Daniel Senise. Retrato espelhada em Despacho (1993). Desta vez as figuras no esto escondidas pela
da Me do Artista. oxidao e to pouco pelo sudrio e, ao contrrio de anteriormente, encarando
Acrlica e xido de uma a outra, elas dominam inteiramente a composio. Sem Ttulo, tambm de 1993,
ferro sobre cretone,
202 x 207 cm, 1992
Daniel Senise.
Despacho
Acrlica, p de ferro
e verniz poliuretnico
sobre cretone, 207 x
304 cm, 1993
MICHAEL ASBURY, Daniel Senise, 2892: entre o ser e o nada, o espectador 33
apresenta a mesma figura feminina duplicada e espelhada, desta vez escondida por
DOSSI
uma sombra que encobre tudo exceto o espao entre elas e, deste espao, surge a
forma de um clssico vaso arquetpico. Em 1994 na pintura Casamento o mesmo vaso
reaparece, porm agora invertido em sua prpria sombra, onde uma figura masculina
e outra feminina aparentemente caminham em volta sua borda.
Daniel Senise. Sem Ttulo. P de ferro e verniz Daniel Senise. Casamento. Acrlica e p
poliuretnico sobre cretone, 207 x 355 cm, 1993 de ferro e encustica sobre cretone, 160
x 190 cm,1994
Estas questes, propagadas por Senise pelo uso de smbolos readymade entre
os anos de 1992 e 1993, nos proporcionam uma maneira de discutir um trabalho
que ele havia concebido ento, mais que seria exposto apenas em 2011, intitulado
de 2892. Os dezoito anos que se passaram entre o conceito e a apresentao foram,
talvez, uma conseqncia daquilo que Senise descreve como seu carter barroco, ou
seja, sua relutncia de deixar as coisas como elas so e em seu desejo de refazer um
2
trabalho, de transform-lo:
Ibid.
DOSSI
contrastava fortemente com o excesso do barroco colonial.4
2892 parece ser uma obra atpica dentro da trajetria criativa de Senise. Formado
por dois longos painis brancos enigmaticamente intitulados Branco 2430 e Branco 462,
os painis foram instalados ao longo das colunas neoclssicas de Montigny e voltados
uns aos outros, formavam portanto um longo corredor como se o artista quisesse
separar o espectador da arquitetura e talvez do mundo. Cada uma dessas telas era
formada pela fuso de segmentos que, juntos, criavam uma grade [grid]. Sutilmente
distintos um do outro, um lado era formado por segmentos quase quadrados enquanto
o outro era constitudo por retngulos mais estreitos com aproximadamente metade
da rea de superfcie do lado oposto.
Estes segmentos diferenciados por tamanho eram, na verdade, lenis de solteiro e
casal esticados. Concebido em 1993, o projeto consistia em doar lenis para um motel
e para um hospital de cncer. Ao fim de suas vidas teis os lenis eram recuperados,
esticados e colocados uns em frente aos outros; de um lado aqueles que foram usados
pelo motel (2430), do outro lado aqueles utilizados pelo hospital (462), formando entre
eles um corredor no qual o espectador caminha durante a exibio. Diferentemente
da obra de Bruce Nauman Green Light Corridor (1970), 2892 de Senise no oprime o
espectador, sendo que no h um confinamento forado ou uma restrio; o espao
entre eles apenas existe como uma via. Os nmeros, que adicionados resultam em 2892,
o ttulo do trabalho, referem-se aos nmeros estimados de corpos que passaram por
cada grupo de lenis. Bem como a descrio deixa explcito, suas distintas dimenses
so determinadas pelo seus usos prvios: pela associao da cama de casal com o sexo
de um lado, e do outro pela cama de solteiro com a morte.
Os lenis no so to pouco readymades. Eles passaram por um processo
dirigido pelo artista mesmo que sua prpria mo, ou seu labor, no estivesse envolvido.
Podemos identificar certas marcas nestas superfcies: manchas teimosas, mnimos
buracos, reas que foram costuradas, leves traos de uso que traem a pureza de
suas superfcies brancas. No tanto um caso de deixar a tela desnuda, mas sim de
reconhecer o fato de que estas so superfcies que foram lavadas, repetitivamente, de
novo e de novo, depois e contra as impresses deixadas por cada corpo. O sudrio
to pouco uma metfora apropriada; os lenis no oferecem nenhum trao visvel
do corpo humano, mas apenas sinais de uso, traos que no podem ser reduzidos
representaes.
Ainda assim, embora no possamos facilmente identificar a presena de smbolos
readymade como Herkenhoff sugere em outras obras de Senise, dentro dos limites
estabelecidos por este trabalho, o espectro de Duchamp perdura. Octavio Paz
4
descreveu o Grande Vidro de Duchamp (A noiva despida por seus celibatrios) e tant Daniel Senise, 2892, Casa Frana-
Donns: 1 la chute d'eau, 2 le gaz d'clairage (Sendo dados: 1. a cascata, 2. o gs de Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, 2011.
36 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
iluminao), como parnteses entre aquilo que no tanto a ideia da arte mas a ideia
DOSSI
questo ontolgica se faz da, onde encontramos algo comparvel com a noo de
DOSSI
Sartre de uma encarnao recproca e dupla.
Ainda assim, tal arranjo recproco entre si mesmo como carne (ser em si) e a
prpria conscincia pessoal (ser para si) do Outro como carne nunca ser completo,
pois esta reciprocidade some assim que consumado, j que o prazer a morte
e fracasso do desejo [] porque no apenas plenitude, mais seu limite e fim.8
O elo totalizador entre o Ser e o Outro, infinito em suas conseqncias,
quebrado pelo olhar: Na reao primordial ao olhar do Outro eu constituo eu
mesmo como um olhar (p. 393). Para Sartre esta confrontao de olhares pode
apenas levar a submisso de um e a dominao do outro. Neste sentido, relaes
entre Ser e Outro so ou masoquistas ou sadistas.
Alex Potts, ao escrever sobre o livro do sculo XVII de Winckelmann, History
of Art of Antiquity, chega a uma concluso similar daquela de Sartre, apenas o objeto
do olhar no carne mas sua representao:
At agora descrevemos um trabalho que coloca o observador entre duas Ibid., p.397.
paredes vazias. Este observador, agora sujeito da obra em si, fica entre o local da
concepo e o da morte. Ambos os fatos ocorreram; eles pertencem a um passado 9
que o espectador concebe no presente. A estrutura um dispositivo que tem duas Potts, Alex, Flesh and the Ideal:
Winkelmann and the origin of art
funes: causar um espao de separao (entre o trabalho e o mundo) daquilo que history, Yale University Press, New
est alm, e encorajar no observador a conscincia da condio dela ou dele de ser. Haven and London, 1994, p. 2.
38 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
A obra alcana isto ao rejeitar qualquer forma de representao, pois fazer isso seria
DOSSI
DOSSI
ideia geradora que Grandjean perseguiu em seu projeto, apia-
se na associao de em templo superior iluminado oposto a
um inferior obscurecido formando uma imagem dual entre a
verdade radiante do caminho do bem em oposio ao erro
e a sua obscura ambincia propicia para a autocontrio e
expiao do erro [] Os dois espaos so simbolicamente
interdependentes demonstrando que o erro e acerto so
duas faces de uma caminhada humana unitria em que uma
depende da outra. A salvao se ope perdio no caminho
da iluminao final.12
que colocam o observador entre esses limites, que despem o Ser transcendental ao Ibid.
40 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Daniel Senise. Casa. Medium acrlico e resduos sobre tecido em colagem sobre madeira, 215 x 2 x 215 cm
MICHAEL ASBURY
Curador, crtico e historiador da arte. Ele professor em teoria e histria da arte no Chelsea College of Art and
Design, University of the Arts London, onde tambm membro do centro de pesquisa Transnational Art, Identity
and Nation (TrAIN) e da CCW Graduate School.
ELIANE CHIRON, ntima mutao da pintura no vdeo digital 41
DOSSI
ELIANE CHIRON
RESUMO
Desde que realizo vdeos digitais, ainda posso
ser considerada pintora? O vdeo me faz, a cada
vez, retornar pintura e assombrado pelas
frases: as cores fazem queimar meu crebro
(Malevich) e se vm como cicatriz sobre um
rosto (Cenino Cennini).
No vdeo Les Nageuses (2011), como a descrio
de piscina por Merleau-Ponty, modelo do
que busca o artista, se encarna nesse vdeo?
Como o ntimo na arte, que segundo Daniel
Arasse surgiu no quadro do Ranascimento,
se metamorfoseou em Les Nageuses? As
referncias histricas sero necessrias para
compreender que pintar supem um contato
ntimo com a matria pictrica, mesmo que
essa matria seja produzida em cdigo, sem
medo de a se perder.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Contemporneo. Cor cicatriz. ntimo.
Mutabilidade.Vdeo digital.
42 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
Cor cicatriz
DOSSI
com imagens no computador e realizo vdeos digitais antes de ter aprendido a tcnica
(mas eu sei o significa pintar e desenhar), eu ainda fao pintura? Mesmo que no
procure pintar com o vdeo, sou obrigada a constatar, cada vez, que o que fao
voltar pintura; percebo que se opera uma transferncia no vdeo e, no final, sem
ter procurado, a pintura que encontro. E penso nos ltimos Ticianos, nos ltimos
Goyas da Casa del Sordo, onde a tinta jogada em respingo ao desprezo da matria,
reinventando os primeiros gestos da arte.
Por um lado, ento, a linguagem, as palavras que nomeiam o mundo exterior,
transfigurada pela arte, se encarnando nela (cujo fogo no pra de arder) e, por outro
as veias de cores de uma caverna na montanha, como cicatrizes num rosto, e no
em outro lugar, a presena sob o olhar desarmado4, ou seja, o mundo interior que
se encarnou. Nesta cena, o branco d acesso cor, carne e ao sangue matrias da
arte da pintura com tudo o que se desprende do corpo, e tudo o que, na escurido
telrica, no fundo dos oceanos, se metamorfoseia. Magma viscoso que se esmaga em
dobras profundas e fraturas gigantescas, escorre e jorra a cada segundo.
A hiptese esta: o meu vdeo digital As Nadadoras (6'50, 2010, 2'21, 2011), que
se pode projetar ou exibir em uma tela de TV, poderia ser chamado de pintura.Vamos
verificar essa hiptese atravs da definio de pintura de W. Benjamin5, definio
especificada pela mancha que emerge tornando-se marca, e as observaes de
Goethe sobre a cor viva. Como a descrio da piscina segundo Merleau-Ponty,modelo
do que os pintores buscam conquistar, se encarna neste vdeo? Como o ntimo na
4
arte, que de acordo com Daniel Arasse apareceu no quadro do Renascimento6, se LYOTARD, J. F. op. cit., p. 163.
transferiu para As Nadadoras? Ser que, no final, saberemos um pouco mais sobre
o ato de pintar? 5
Nadadoras pela sua rapidez, sua brevidade propositada e sua montagem em loop , BENJAMIN, Walter. Op. cit.,
44 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
cada segundo, apario da cor que desaparece. Assim, no final, quando a ltima
DOSSI
onde ocorre a deflagrao do ser regressando ao abismo que o artista ressente mais
DOSSI
do que qualquer outro. Profundidade da qual um mergulhador deve retornar, disse
Valry. Profundidade que Dubuffet constela com asas de borboleta. Uma vez que
o artista no uma borboleta com cores vibrantes, onde deveria ele ir buscar sua
cor, desde sempre? Lacan nos sussura ao p da orelha9: nos resduos, na viscosidade
do material desintegrado, esmagado, dissolvido e oxidado, digerido, apodrecidas na
gua, cozidas pelo calor, o fogo ou ao sol. Na lama e nas vsceras. l onde, desde os
comeos, a cor se faz. So as cores nativas de Duchamp, a cor do chocolate que o
celibatrio mi, ele mesmo... essas so as cores-matrias de Les Nageuses.
Porque se sobressai, especialmente na pintura, a cor faz esquecer o sem fundo
primordial de onde vem: do abismo, por definio, sem fundo. O vermelho no incio de
Les Nageuses se assemelha ltima pincelada em Frenhofer: para o pintor, no existe
nenhum grau abaixo do afloramento superfcie, como na garganta dos afogados... Se, 9
nas palavras de Roger de Piles, a cor uma maquiagem, isso s pode ser na expresso: LACAN, J. Le sminaire. Livre XI. Les
quatre concepts fondamentaux de
corar subitamente*, o pharmakon com o qual se maquia os cadveres, dando a iluso la psychanalyse (1964), Paris, Seuil,
de vida. Ela deve, portanto, dar a impresso de ter brotado no suporte, de ser uma 1973, p. 107.
zgraphia, uma pintura viva. Klee multiplica as camadas de fundo em suas pinturas e
as cores de Poussin parecem emergir das trevas para a retornar. O nascimento de *
vida em equivalncia com a morte, talvez seja esse tambm o escndalo de Olympia: No original: la couleur est un fard, ce
ne peut tre selon lexpression : pi-
a cor cadavrica do corpo de Victorine Meurent, que diz da possvel putrefao da quer un fard. A autora faz um jogo
carne, da origem repugnante das cores, da morte sobre a vida, e que, decapitada pela entre a palavra fard, maquiagem,
fita ao redor do pescoo, olha-nos diretamente nos olhos. As cores de Les Nageuses, disfarce, e a expresso piquer un
fard que significar corar, enrubescer
emergindo das trevas, nos olham de suas profundezas. subitamente, ficar vermelho como um
pimento. N.T.
liane Chiron.
Les Nageuses 1, vdeo
digital, 2 24, 2011.
46 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
nadadoras permanecem nessa gua enquadrada, virtual, modelo reduzido de toda gua
na qual possamos nos banhar. como se eu fizesse uma experincia de laboratrio
filmando as nadadoras imersas num lquido de laboratrio cuja substncia modificarei
mais tarde pela cor, atravs do computador, seguindo o protocolo de uma rigorosa
experimentao, que daria oportunidade superfcie de aflorar sua profundeza nos
reflexos. O ponto de vista distante faz a cena recuar no tempo. Desde que as capturo
na filmagem, as duas nadadoras esto sob disco rgido da cmera e presas num
passado que recua at o momento em que as guas salgadas submergiram na fenda
que formou o Golfo Prsico. A cmera transfigura a cena em sistema binrio. Ele
Captura a indiferena matemtica da gua e das nadadoras, que vejo como prisioneiras
da tela, dando voltas sem fim nesse espao confinado. A gua no est na piscina,
nem na tela, mas na intimidade csmica do universo ao qual o numrico d acesso.
Quando a minha filmadora segue as nadadoras para no deix-las sair do da gua
enquadrada pela tela, penso nos assassinatos em piscinas, no cinema: Les Diaboliques
(1955), La Piscine (1968), a srie de James Bond (1962-2008), nos afogados do Titanic
(1997), e sobretudo queles que tentam nadar e se salvar no afresco do Dilvio,
do convento da igreja Santa Maria Novella em Florena12. Afresco danificado neste
claustro que se abre para um pequeno jardim, que fui ver, com a garganta apertada: para
mim, o verdadeiro dilvio est l, em pintura que ele existe, neste fresco desvanecido
e parcialmente apagado, aberto a todos os ventos h quase cinco sculos. Na linhagem
desses filmes recuando at esse afresco, a cmera captura a juno do ser vivo ao
meio onde o drama da existncia se encena. No ser humano, observa Dagognet, que
filsofo e mdico, o interior e o exterior permitem o fora do antigo dentro 13. Na
realidade o ser humano j no se encontra protegido pelos ossos ou seus equivalentes
que envolveriam o corpo na origem da vida. Eu me coloco absolutamente do lado
dessa fragilidade. isso que quero magnficar assim como no afresco do Dilvio, para 12
Isso ficar ao encargo dos clculos feitos pelo computador, as camadas de cores,
que alteram profundamente a definio das imagens, fazendo-as recuar para 13
assim como daqueles de seus corpos submetendo sua aparncia fora inerente ARENDT, H. Condition de lhomme
moderne (1961), trad. G. Fradier,
distncia14. Enquanto dados matemticos, elas so traduzidas em esquemas idnticos prf. P. Ricur, Paris, Calmann-Lvy,
s estruturas mentais humanas. As nadadoras e a gua se metamorfoseiam em 1994, p. 335-338.
48 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
smbolos provenientes de leis csmicas universais; elas tem seu ponto de referncia
DOSSI
liane Chiron.
Les Nageuses 1, vdeo
digital, 2 24, 2011.
Mutaes do ntimo na pintura
Foi no Renascimento, sc. XV, que o ntimo foi concebido e pensado na pintura,
com a instaurao do quadro moderno, definido por Alberti como janela aberta
para o mundo. Dando a isso uma maior amplitude, G.Wajman concebe que o quadro
moderno ter instaurado, por um mesmo gesto, a idia cartesiana que o homem
tem direito, a partir de ento, de olhar para o mundo com Deus, e define o ntimo
como o lugar no mundo onde o homem pode se manter separado do mundo, onde,
pela janela, em segredo, pode contemplar e atravs da qual, exceo de todo olhar
15
pode olhar para si mesmo15. nessa poca que a pintura se torna uma arte liberal
http://www.lacan.com/symptom8_ar- pela introduo da matemtica, graas ao uso da perspectiva. Pela janela albertiana
ticles/wajcman8.html. Consulta em que permite uma vista, o mundo representado segundo as leis da perspectiva
19-10-2011.
legtima, oriunda da geometria, por definio medida da terra. A fim de explorar
a inveno do ntimo no quadro, no Renascimento, Daniel Arasse lembra esta idia
16
DOSSI
representado, mas simulado pelo digital? Onde o visor da cmera substitui a janela
de Alberti? Segundo que processo o vdeo digital Les Nageuses17 (2010-2011) faz
meno potncia infiltrada pela cincia contempornea e revela nas suas cores as
permutaes entre carne e sangue, e entre as foras telricas e o fogo magmtico?
Blanchot recusava a intimidade fechada, esse mau interior que nos exclui
do acesso verdadeiro s coisas. Ele quer atingir esse ponto que Barthes nomear
punctum e designar como ferida ntima, carnal, que est na obra e no entanto fora
de campo. A cor a cicatriz, ela se pinta sobre a face dos observadores, graas aos
neurnios espelhos, descobertos em 1996 pelo neurologista Rizzolatti. No intervalo
dessa transferncia, acontece esse ponto de origem da obra:ao mesmo tempo ntimo
e exterior, uma intimidade que, em ns, ser a realidade do que est fora tal como
estaramos no exterior dessa intimidade e amplido ntima desse fora18.
No vdeo, quero que elas nadem no interior de seus prprios corpos e no
exterior deles, nessa ntima reversibilidade do vivo (Dagognet). Elas se deslocam
como no universo onde s encontramos a ns mesmos e nada vemos alm do que
se reduz aos esquemas que o ser humano trs em si. Ao inverso da cincia, no h
progresso na arte, aos smbolos matemticos os mitos se superpem como outras 17
fuso do cdigo digital e do cdigo gentico, proveniente das grandes fossas abissais
onde um dia nasceu a vida. Para os pixels visveis de perto nos ltimos segundos 20
Ibid., p. 253.
(verso de 2011) Les Nageuses so fabricadas, derivadas, como Pandora. Assim os
ricos panejamentos numricos com os quais poderiam estar vestidas simulam as
21
movimentaes de nossos tecidos e lquidos fisiolgicos no brilho da substncia Le Dressing, Espace dart FreePStar,
profunda da noite csmica. Exposto em um espao de arte no Marais, em Paris21, 1er-31 mai 2010, noite e dia.
50 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Les Nagueses faz aparecer a cidade mais intensamente na dissipao da noite e das
DOSSI
cores num regime noturno de imagens, entrelaada com a rua sua histria sangrenta
sob o antigo regime da revoluo, o rio que carregou os corpos de algerianos em
17 de outubro de 1961 eu me lembro que Merleau Ponty nomeia a carne do
mundo. Noturno, ocenico, csmico, anti-diluviano, ele cintila nas origens da vida
22
confundida com a arte.
WILDE, Oscar. De profondis. La O vdeo digital cumpriria a cintilao de nossa alteridade indiferenciada, ou a
Ballade de la gele de Reading poitica encontrada no caminho do sangue de uma linhagem artstica, de uma genealogia
(Librairie gnrale franaise, 2000,
1905 et 1962 pour De profondis; mtica e de uma carne csmica. Se encarnando em outros corpos o artista desce na
1898 pour La Ballade), precedido de paisagem lquida como o sangue nas veias, incorpora a paisagem virtual onde seu
LArtiste en prison dA. Camus, trad. corpo no encontra lugar, o cu que foge/ Atravs de um cubo de gelo (le ciel qui fuit
et prf. L. Lack et J. Besson, Paris,
Le Livre de Poche, coll. Classique, / travers un carr de glace)22, que olhou Reading com paixo, o condenado morte
2004, p. 213. celebrado por Oscar Wilde em Ballade de la gele de Reading. Mas em Les Nageuses,
poca em que pela primeira vez a cor prpura simulada por clculos, o cu torna-se
cientfico? O que no anula os poderes peremptrios da arte. O vdeo Les Nageuses
exposto pela primeira vez em 2010, pouco antes da erupo de Eyjafjll, na Islndia,
da fuga do petrleo no Golfo do Mxico, dos incndios da Rssia e das inundaes
no Paquisto, anunciam a tragdia de Fukushima. Reelaborado posteriormente em
2011, torna-se profecia, revelando fora de contexto, as trevas contemporneas sob
as ameaas que rondam nossos corpos. As nadadoras fazem transfuses entre elas
mesmas, na velocidade da luz de seus pixels, no pelas lembranas privadas da infncia,
nem as cenas pblicas da histria, mas pelo que Rilke nomeia intimidade do corao:
intimidade de uma anamnse magmtica, da noite csmica e da profundidade ocenica
liane Chiron.
Les Nageuses 1, vdeo
digital, 2 24, 2011.
ELIANE CHIRON, ntima mutao da pintura no vdeo digital 51
comum a todas as artes. Esta profundidade no est na piscina, mas nas cores do
DOSSI
vdeo e de sua transmutao em ns. Nos nossos cromossomas e no nosso DNA
que comum a todos em 99%.
S a arte, que procura na carne e no sangue a indiferena dos gneros e das
pocas, se levanta, como queria Mallarm, potncia do cu estrelado que contm,
virtualmente, a multiplicidade das galxias cada vez mais antigas que os telescpios mais
e mais gigantes permitem aproximar, com exceo da matria negra* indetectvel
pela astrofsica. Compondo 95% do universo, s pode ser simulada digitalmente.
Com o digital mesmo a simulao das cores da carne e do sangue se extraem de
leis csmicas que ultrapassam o sistema solar. Distintas das leis planetrias e naturais,
elas transfiguram duravelmente dor e precariedade revelado-os no ritmo vivo do
colorido. Digital ou no, a arte abriria com essa matria negra, ou massa ausente
do universo, rica de todos os tons ocultos do obscuro, incalculvel. Essa matria
negra, como os pretos de Malevich ou de Matisse, a cor do oculto na carne. o
que permite a encarnao demonstrada pela neurocincias. Em nossos crebro, os
neurnios-espelho provocam, atravs de nosso olhar, o esboo do gesto aqui das
nadadoras fazendo surgir em crculos, do negro, suas cores, a cada volta que dura
2 minutos e 21 segundos. Ento, se o vdeo pode ser projetado ao contrrio numa
grande tela, com um som de mquina ressoando como em um grande canteiro
telrico, espcie de inferno, devemos sentir a sensao de estar no meio da cor se
produzindo num ensurdecedor rudo. Na cor como meio, enfim, desvinculada de um *
gesto, com meios renovados a cada poca, sem que os meios tradicionais se tornem CASSIRER, E. Langage et mythe.
propos des noms de dieux (1924),
obsoletos, uma vez que no h progresso na arte. Convm, no entanto, de qualquer trad. O. Hanse-Love, Paris, Minuit,
maneira e sem descanso, retornar s origens, ao que chamado, nos mitos, antes 1973, p. 63-64.
do Dilvio, que provoca o artista e o faz mergulhar.Vtima e carrasco.
Na vida real (diz Louise Bourgeois), eu me identifico com a vtima, por isso me 24
voltei para a arte. Na minha arte eu sou o assassino. Eu simpatizo com a situao do Louise Bourgeois: sculptures, environ-
nements, dessins 1938-1995, Paris,
assassino24. Em Les nageuses, atravs da cor pictrica que eu assassino, incinerando Muse dart moderne de la ville de
uma delas na lava fervente. A projeo da piscina o quadro perfeito, como Paris, 1995, p. 49.
52 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
dizemos em David Hockney? Em Portrait of Artist (Piscina com duas figuras) 197225,o
DOSSI
Gregory nageant. Los Angeles, 1e digo cor [acrescentava Lyotard], isso se entende como sendo toda matria pictrica.
mars 1982, montagem com polarod, De modo inverso a Czanne diante da montanha, no cinema e mais freqentemente
70,5 x 130,2 cm, coll. D. Hockney.
na televiso que erupes vulcnicas e tsunamis, catstrofes de todas as espcies,
penetraram em imagens provocadas pelos neurnios-espelhos, no ntimo do que se
30
v em mim (Merleau-Ponty). Eu quis atribuir a esses neurnios-espelhos, imateriais
Hockney, op. cit., p. 197.
e luminosos, bem reais para mim, sua ntima materialidade pictrica, cromossmica,
atravs da mutabilidade da cor que a torna propcia ao desarmamento do olhar32,
31
na derrota do esprito. Condies de um devir mucoso, rgos, palpitar do corao,
LYOTARD, op. cit., p. 163.
vsceras. E com isso que, definitivamente, pintamos. As mutaes de uma piscina e
32
das nadadoras no so apenas uma desculpa para experimentar a mutabilidade ntima
Ibid. da material digital.
ELIANE CHIRON, ntima mutao da pintura no vdeo digital 53
Foi por acaso que filmei em 2008, em Bahen, esse pas do Golfo que foi
DOSSI
sacudido, trs anos mais tarde, como os outros, pela primavera rabe? Ser que vi
nas duas nadadoras cuja diferena de origem me tocaram, a violncia do conflito que
aconteceria? Conflito sobre o qual caiu um muro de silncio. O que eu vi, no foi
o azul de uma piscina de um hotel de luxo para turistas afortunados, mas sua parte
obscura, sua tragdia latente. Como um chamado. Da mesma forma que Hockney, que
foi designer grfico33 e durante muito tempo fez experimentaes com computador
e impressoras a cores, expulsou o azul das piscinas californianas e do cu dos tetos
barrocos para dar lugar a esse vermelho vivo de que so pintadas as imensas telas
do Grand Canyon34, chagas vivas a cu aberto. Sob a fina tira de cu azul que corre nas
744.2 cm de comprimento do Bigger Grand Canyon, vemos sua carne vomitada pelas
bocas abertas de um par de condenados, em um duplo grito ertil. 33
assim como o pintor chins na paisagem. Tornar-se como a nadadora que se afoga A Bigger Grand Canyon, 1998, huile
sur 60 toiles, 207 x 744 cm, coll.
nos pixels, boca aberta, e renasce do seu sangue. Entre o mundo e eu, escolher o
D. Hockney.
mundo, disse Kafka. Dar surgimento a um mundo em pintura, mesmo que por meio
do vdeo digital. Hockney, impressionado com uma exposio de Picasso na Galeria
Tate, diz: Ele poderia dominar todos os estilos, todas as tcnicas. A lio que posso 35
tirar que devemos utilizar todos os meios. Maneira de retornar, a cada vez, s AGAMBEN, G. Quest ce que le
contemporain? , trad. M. Rovere,
origens genealgicas da arte, a um campo expandido da pintura, o verdadeiro corpo Paris, Payot et Rivages, coll. Poche,
da artista. Maneira, assim como Louise Bourgeois, de escolher a arte sobre a vida. 2008, p. 21.
26 de Outubro 2011
REFERNCIAS
AGAMBEN, G. Quest ce que le contemporain?, trad. M. Rovere, Paris, Payot et Rivages, coll. Poche, 2008.
ARASSE, D. Le sujet dans le tableau. Essais diconographie analytique (1997), Paris, Flammarion, 4
dition 2010.
ARENDT, H. Condition de lhomme moderne (1961), trad. G. Fradier, prf. P. Ricur, Paris, Calmann-
Lvy, 1994.
CASSIRER, E. Langage et mythe. propos des noms de dieux (1924), trad. O. Hanse-Love, Paris, Minuit,
1973.
BAZAINE, J. Le temps de la peinture (1938-1989), Paris, Aubier, 1990.
54 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
BLANCHOT, M. LEspace littraire, Paris, Gallimard, coll. Folio Essais, 1955, p. 173.
DOSSI
LIANE CHIRON
Artista Plstica, Professora Emrita na Universidade de Paris I, Panthon-Sorbonne onde defendeu tese de Estado.
Dirige, na Universidade de Paris I, o Centro de Pesquisas em Artes Visuais (CRAV). Sua pesquisa, em cruzamento com
a prtica artstica, interroga o processo de criao e as mutaes do olhar, principalmente em relao ao digital.
Publica e expe em diversos pases (Brasil, China, Tunisia, Coria, etc.). Editou em Publications de la Sorbonne, uma
srie de obras: X, luvre en procs : Croisements dans lart (1996), Croisements des arts (1997), Lincertain dans
lart (1998), La main en procs dans les arts plastiques (2000), Lobjet et son lieu (2004). Paysages croiss. La
part du corps (2008), Migrations / Mutations. Paysages dans lart contemporain (2010), Lintime, le priv, le public
dans lart contemporain (2012). No prelo: Lnigme du visible.
CARLOS ZILIO, A pintura como indagao 55
DOSSI
CARLOS ZILIO
RESUMO
Este artigo analisa o processo de elaborao
de minha pintura. Desde o sentimento
histrico da crise da modernidade, a pintura
sempre significou para mim uma forma de
compreender a amplitude e o significado da
dita crise.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Pintura. Crise da modernidade. Carlos Zilio.
Arte contempornea.
56 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
*
Nota do Autor. Este texto , em
Na segunda metade da dcada de 1960, a crise da modernidade no Brasil
parte, devedor de vrios textos j prenunciada pelo fim do Projeto Construtivo Brasileiro em suas verses Arte
crticos sobre o meu trabalho. Ele se Concreta e Arte Neo-Concreta, ganhou no movimento conhecido como Nova
baseia em comunicao que fiz para
o Ciclo de Palestras organizado pela Figurao Brasileira, sua expresso definitiva. As premissas desta produo poderiam
Profa. Iclia Cattani, cujo tema foi ser resumidas em alguns princpios gerais: impessoalidade da execuo, o que implicava
A pintura em seu campo especfico, na possibilidade da reprodutibilidade da obra e no questionamento da autoria, a
na Fundao Iber Camargo, em
2010. Ele integra minha pesquisa interao entre obra e espectador, a no hierarquia entre alta e baixa culturas e a
para o CNPq. relao entre arte e poltica. Neste contexto surge meu trabalho de arte demarcado
por estas questes que, portanto, j se localizavam fora da lgica de uma ontologia
1 baseada na forma.1
Participei de algumas das exposies O embate que meu trabalho vivenciou neste perodo o de se situar em
mais importantes do perodo como
Opinio 66 Nova Objetividade Bra- uma cultura que ingressava mesmo que perifericamente na esfera da sociedade
sileira em 1967, ambas no MAM Rio. de consumo. Distanciado do interesse pela autonomia da forma, o que se tornava
CARLOS ZILIO, A pintura como indagao 57
pregnante era a presena da imagem vinculada ao verbo, como uma fonte possvel
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de experimentao. O importante era o potencial de comunicao com o pblico
e a possibilidade de ativar o circuito das relaes polticas, de modo a operar uma
manobra de desalienao social.
Em um segundo momento, j nos anos 1970, esta experincia comea a
incorporar novas fontes que repercutem diretamente na produo do perodo e
em meu trabalho. Duchamp desloca o debate e a linguagem para um terreno mais
definidor das normas, ao colocar a radicalidade da questo da prpria natureza da
arte. Por outro lado, se a tradio da arte construtiva no Brasil havia sofrido uma
ruptura, o vigor da sua lio permaneceu e nesta poca, a Minimal e a Ps-Minimal
vo recolocar, tambm, questes que renovam as possibilidades da investigao
fenomenolgica.
Momentos deste percurso podem ser detectados no meu trabalho deste perodo.
Uma marmita que ao ser aberta revela um rosto com a palavra LUTE sobre a boca
(1967), uma mala dita de executivo, que ao ser aberta tem um campo de pregos
(1973), ou estruturas de madeira que equilibram blocos de pedra em tenso (1976)
seriam trs exemplos deste processo.2
A experincia percorrida por minha produo entre 1966 e 1976 a do
desencanto da modernidade. A partir deste ponto tratava-se para mim, de
compreender a amplitude e o significado desta crise, examinar suas premissas e seus
cnones, de modo a extrair deste embate uma relao histrica pertinente.
Para realizar esta operao, elegi a pintura que por ter sido o paragone da arte
clssica e moderna estava no centro da crise da arte. No por acaso, todo o formalismo
de Greenberg tem como centro de sua anlise a pintura. Optar por este suporte
era, antes de tudo, a compreenso do seu potencial como campo terico capaz de
proporcionar por seu enfrentamento uma viso crtica e produtiva.
Este perodo de novos desafios deve necessariamente ser pensado tendo como
referncia minha estada em Paris de 1976 a 1980. A este respeito, Paulo Venancio
Filho faz um comentrio interessante: Seria apenas uma ironia da arte o fato do
artista de vanguarda e do engajamento poltico dar sequncia discreta presena
da mstica tradio pictrica de Paris (provavelmente o ltimo aps Eduardo Sued)?
Encontrar prazer em uma aposta artstica vencida, em um terreno desimpedido
das reivindicaes da atualidade ao qual deve prestar contas s a si mesmo, 2
compensao, desforra ou desiluso poltica? Voltar a ser artista sem presso Para acessar os trabalhos que
ideolgica e substitu-la por outra absolutamente privada afinal o comprometimento ilustram o texto, consultar site www.
carloszilio.com.
existencial da mesma ordem.3
Ao contrrio dos artistas de pocas anteriores, ao chegar a Paris, eu sabia,
3
como minha gerao, que a cidade no era mais o centro mundial da arte e que Paulo Venancio Filho in Carlos Zilio,
Nova York notoriamente havia ocupado esta posio. Porm Paris me proporcionava Cosac Naify, 2006.
58 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
um espao longe das presses para poder ter o distanciamento crtico necessrio
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reflexo sobre minha atuao artstica e poltica: uma dupla crtica se impe e que de
imediato recoloca em causa a viso de vanguarda artstica e a de vanguarda poltica
que para mim haviam sido, at ento, elementos inseparveis da relao arte e poltica.
Torna-se uma evidncia que ambas vises (a poltica e a artstica) tomavam a si como
consequncia natural de um processo histrico teleolgico que as consagrava como
verdade histrica.
Refazer uma relao com a Histria e, mais particularmente, com a Histria da
Arte era uma potencialidade dada por estar vivendo em uma cidade que possibilitava
do Louvre ao Centro Pompidou Beaubourg, inaugurado nesta poca, com a grande
retrospectiva de Duchamp. Alm da imerso nos museus parisienses, a prpria
cultura francesa ir ter na minha formao uma repercusso importante, por meio
sobretudo, da Escola dos Anais e a Nova Histria com seu sentido de longa durao,
da viso de arqueologia em Foucault e da concepo de Histria da Arte de Hubert
Damisch como um processo transistrico, ou seja, que a Histria da Arte diacrnica
e sincrnica, linear e simultnea.
Se a pintura se coloca para mim como o suporte por excelncia, que transita
entre passado/presente, retom-la significava compreender que ela portava agora um
sinal negativo, uma descontinuidade radical com o mundo, um estranhamento. E foi
esta conscincia de crise do suporte, de descontinuidade epistmica entre o suporte
e o real que norteou a minha relao com a pintura.
Colocada historicamente em cheque, a pintura para manter o seu potencial
crtico deveria, portanto, se colocar radicalmente em causa. Pintar passou a ser para
mim, pintar a pintura.
Visto por um ngulo mais produtivo, a obra de alguns artistas passou a ter no
meu processo de trabalho um valor de referncia. O estabelecimento de uma relao
transistrica abrangendo Czanne e Jasper Johns, como a relao entre o moderno
e a crise do moderno. A dvida cezaniana no mais como mtodo na relao entre
sensao e real, mas tomada agora no embate da reconduo da pintura com sua
pertinncia histrica. Barnett Newman, por outro lado, prope uma complexidade
conceitual e a possibilidade de superar o formalismo com uma concepo de Histria
da Arte erguida sobre o conceito de sublime, mais prxima de Meyer Schapiro com
seu conceito de forma significante. So possibilidades de se tomar o embate com
a pintura num mbito de reflexo, longe da demanda ditada pelos mecanismos de
reificao ao gosto do sistema da arte.
Pintar implicou em localizar, no mbito da produo pictrica, questes
produtivas capazes de revelar um pensamento sobre a prpria pintura. Estes objetivos
foram definidos por aproximaes culturais e tericas sempre referenciadas em obras
pictricas. Entre aproximadamente 1980 e 1985, por exemplo, coloquei-me como
CARLOS ZILIO, A pintura como indagao 59
questo a relao com o que se denomina de brasilidade, isto , uma certa viso
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de arte brasileira originada desde a dcada de 1920 e que perdurou com fora at
o incio dos anos sessenta.
De um modo concreto, isto se traduzia para minha prtica em me colocar
diante de certos trabalhos de Tarsila do Amaral e da obra de Alfredo Volpi, alm
da evocao de um sentimento de geometria dada pela paisagem carioca nas suas
relaes entre montanha, cu e mar. Nesta mesma poca, o texto de Greenberg sobre
o Ps-Expressionismo Abstrato me causa uma srie de indagaes que objetivamente
resultam em buscar se relacionar com o sentido cromtico e espacial das obras de
Monet/Volpi, Matisse/Manet e posteriormente Rousseau. Brasilidade e abstrao
encaminhadas a um limite, desembocando em um excesso que compreendia explorar
o exotismo e Rousseau.
A propsito deste encaminhamento,Wilson Coutinho observou: uma dialtica
do retorno com a sensao consciente do presente. Neste sistema, a obra de Zilio
no procura recuar, mas se debater em a intrincada rede de questes plsticas.
Nunca na pintura de Zilio ira aparecer uma enciclopdia de citaes diretas, mas ela
abriga procedimentos e questes problemticas. Como fazer com que a pintura lisa
transforme-se em uma pintura de engajamento, de extrao de camadas ou combinar,
como procedimento as duas atitudes? Ao mesmo tempo como manter como padro
de reconhecimento uma astcia que no deseja o esquecimento da existncia de
Barnett Newman o ntegro sublime. No o esquecendo em uma pintura que no
se deseja mais o sublime? Como afast-lo, mantendo-o e depois como confrontar-se
com Rousseau no desconhecendo Matisse, nem o prprio Newman? O fascnio
o de organizar um problema em torno de um procedimento que chamei de austero
e que estranha a iconografia banal para deix-la estranha em excesso.4
Esgotada uma investigao como encerrada a partida de um jogo.D-se,
ento, o incio de uma outra partida, isto , da redefinio de quais novos problemas
pictricos vo ser objeto desta nova partida.5 A prxima partida se inicia por volta
de 1987 e tinha como provocao inicial a de tomar a tela em branco, sem qualquer
a priori, como um apagamento do excesso iconogrfico anterior a um campo de
exerccio pleno de subjetividade. Aparecem novamente elementos que compunham
o meu repertrio no perodo dito poltico (lixa, pregos, serras) que agora vo criar 4
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funcionaram como questes chaves para pintar a pintura, o processo agora tende
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principalmente a se fechar sobre si tomando como base a sua prpria trajetria,
embora sempre sujeito a novos estmulos vindos da Histria da Arte. Reaparece
com especial nfase a relao com minhas pinturas realizadas entre 1985 e 1987. So
trabalhos marcados pelo luto. No por acaso trava-se, tambm, um dilogo subjetivo
com o Rothko das cores abissais e soturnas da srie Seagram building. Considerando,
contudo, estas mediaes o luto surge mais como uma reflexo sobre o exerccio
do luto na pintura do que sobre sua vivncia.
Esta trajetria j longa, de embate permanente formulado sobre uma estratgia
de desenvolver questes complexas que a pintura avaliou e que so sistematicamente
enfrentadas, confere ao conjunto do trabalho uma unidade que se caracteriza pela
fragmentao. A resultante a permanente indagao sobre a densidade terica que
o suporte da pintura traz da sua longa vivncia cultural e histrica. O sentido desta
manobra, como procurei desenvolver ao longo deste texto, o de investigar novas
possibilidades de configurao da pintura, manter presente seu valor cognitivo e criar
um pensamento pictrico singular.
CARLOS ZILIO
Artista e pesquisador ligado ao PPGAV/UFRJ, Programa de Ps-Graduao em Artes Visuais da Universidade Federal
do Rio de Janeiro.
PAULO PASTA, Dentro e fora da pintura 63
DOSSI
PAULO PASTA
RESUMO
Neste ensaio, o pintor Paulo Pasta pretende
contar uma histria de dentro de seu prprio
trabalho; ou seja, a partir das formas que usou
como motivao para sua pintura, o autor
aponta para as principais questes que fizeram
a sua experincia. Uma relao mediada pela
feitura, em que procura precisamente construir
uma distncia reflexiva entre o projeto e a
experincia real da pintura.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Pintura. Experincia. Cor. Forma. Paulo Pasta.
64 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
A pintura, para mim, desde cedo, foi tambm auto-descoberta. No tenho com
nenhuma outra linguagem a relao de intimidade que tenho com ela. Descobri-la foi
descobrir a vocao. Isso se fez ainda mais claro no momento crucial das escolhas
profissionais: digo sempre que posso ter passado por vrias crises, mas no pela de
vocao. Entendo, hoje, o grau de idealidade existente nesta condio, e penso que
tal idealidade um aspecto importante para a compreenso do meu trabalho.
Prometi a mim mesmo seguir esse caminho, como uma senda para se estar
melhor no mundo. Desse modo, a pintura sempre foi uma atividade muito rente
a minha prpria vida. Hoje percebo que ela parece querer contar, de maneira ao
mesmo tempo muito prxima e muito abstrata e mediada a minha prpria histria.
Com isso, quero dizer tambm, que meu trabalho nunca teve um sentido projetivo.
Ele pode nascer de uma ideia, de uma vontade, mas o que busco justamente evitar
que o desejo se precipite de imediato em projeto; talvez a pintura para mim seja a
construo dessa distancia entre desejo e projeto. Parece-me que a pintura teria que
contar por si mesma, e de forma indireta e condensada, a lenta transformao dos
contedos vividos. Essa seria a sua maneira de imitar em abstrato as contingncias
da vida. Digo em abstrato porque penso que as formas que escolho para pintar se
parecem muito com esquemas do real. E na lenta atualizao e maturao de tais
esquemas, ou signos, que o sentido parece se fazer.
Gosto de pensar que uma dada pintura estaria pronta quando somou todos os
meus estados, quando condensou minhas sensaes. S assim poderia me reconhecer
nela, que s ento ganharia uma espcie de idealidade e suspenso. Por isso tambm
, talvez, um pouco lenta: de algum modo, ela dia aps dia e tinta sobre tinta. E, se
meus temas e meus assuntos tem durao longa, repetindo-se e desdobrando-se,
seria justamente porque s assim se tornariam efetivamente meus e profundamente
reconhecidos por mim.
PAULO PASTA, Dentro e fora da pintura 65
Mas, como vinha dizendo, tudo isso comeou muito cedo. Ver pinturas
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equivalente, para mim, ao prazer de pintar. E foi vendo pinturas, reprodues dos
trabalhos dos mestres da pintura universal, que meu gosto se afirmou. A superfcie
pictrica, a fatura, sempre foi o elemento que parecia unir minha sensao ao mundo.
Essa qualidade, mais a cor, foram os elementos que fundaram meu gosto e deram-me
confiana em seguir com minha escolha.
No incio, empregava os temas mais comuns da pintura de gnero. Paisagens e
naturezas mortas, nessa ordem. Gostava igualmente de Czanne,Van Gogh e Monet.
Mas penso que foi a partir da lio de Czanne que se deu, para mim, a compreenso
do que seriam as diferenas entre ver e pintar: a descoberta de uma verdadeira
construo pictrica.
Foi movido tambm por seu exemplo, e no s querendo retratar uma paisagem
local, que iniciei uma srie de desenhos com o tema dos canaviais. Nesse momento,
eu pensava que teria que constituir uma base slida em desenho para s depois
me aventurar pelas tintas. (Sofria a, sem saber, uma contingncia comum a grande
parte dos pintores modernos brasileiros, e que deve sua origem ao programa e aos
ensinamentos das escolas de belas -artes de Paris, onde muitos dos nossos artistas
estudaram e fizeram formao). Mas eram desenhos coloridos. No empregava apenas
a linha ou o contorno. Eles j apontavam para a necessidade de uma construo
mediada pelas cores e valores pictricos.
Nesse perodo, j olhava de maneira especial a pintura de Matisse e pensava que
teria que fazer alguma coisa com isso. Posso dizer, tambm, que esse pintor sempre
esteve presente, como modelo, durante todo meu percurso, apenas variando, de
acordo com a poca, os aspectos de sua influncia. E poderia afirmar tambm, que,
se penso as minhas possibilidades de expresso pela cor apoiado no seu exemplo, foi
tambm atravs desse exemplo que pude constatar as minhas dificuldades em us-las
vivas e contrastantes. Costumo pensar, ento, que a pintura de Matisse, que tanto
admiro, seria para mim uma espcie de ideal, e que seria na diferena e distncia que
estabeleo com ela, que melhor se revelaria quem sou.
Quando comecei a usar tintas, a escolha natural deveria ser pelo leo, seja pela
sua histria e tradio, seja tambm por seu poder expressivo; mas a tcnica que
escolhi para realizar uma srie de pinturas depois dos referidos desenhos, foi o guache.
Buscava uma tinta a base de gua, que fosse fosca, e que tambm no guardasse o
aspecto muitas vezes artificial da tinta acrlica. (Uma tinta a base de gua realizaria
tambm a passagem do desenho para a pintura de modo mais natural).
Durante um ano realizei guaches sobre papel. E esses trabalhos j traziam as
marcas de outra grande influncia: a pintura metafsica italiana. A sugesto de tempo
parado, de suspenso, presente nessas pinturas, sempre me pareceu muito prximas
das minhas prprias sensaes. A paleta de cores tambm. Muitas delas parecendo
66 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
um pintor que me deu a chave para escapar tambm prpria metafsica. O mundo,
em suas pinturas, o mundo fsico e carnal, parece ter ido embora para poder sobrar
algo do durvel do mundo. Assim, ele se manteve, de certa maneira, sempre um pintor
metafsico, mas substituiu a nomenclatura, a retrica do movimento, pela adoo de
um repertrio mais afeito ao cotidiano. (Se, por um lado devo muito a Matisse, por
outro devo muito a Morandi. Talvez esse cotejo entre os dois somente se explique
nas idiossincrasias da formao, e a eu tambm poderia incluir a pintura de Volpi,
sem prejudicar uma possvel noo de coerncia).
Esses trabalhos a guache eram inequivocamente figurativos. Manequins,
instrumentos como martelos e tesouras, mesas, cadeiras, chapus, modelos de gesso,
eram motivos freqentes. Depois de um ano trabalhando nessa direo, voltei a usar
tinta a leo, agora com o acrscimo da cera de abelha (um meio tambm chamado
de verniz de cera, ou encustica fria), o que abriu novas possibilidades expressivas no
meu trabalho. Esse veculo deu ao leo uma luz mais turva, arrefeceu as passagens
entre as cores, e, se posso dizer, criou uma temporalidade distinta ao retardar a luz,
ao faz-la menos brilhante.
Fui abandonando tambm uma metafsica dos objetos e buscando um repertrio
Sem ttulo, 1989 de formas mais simplificadas. As sucessivas camadas de leo com cera foram
leo e cera sobre tela
220 x 190 cm apagando as imagens, tornando-as assim, vestgios de imagens. Estas respondiam
Coleo particular tambm a uma disposio mais resoluta da superfcie da tela, tornando-se mais planas
e topogrficas. Essas figuras eram essencialmente
formas arquitetnicas. Ogivas, arcos, frontes, que, ao
mesmo tempo em que me remetiam a uma condio
de passado, davam-me a possibilidade de estruturar
o quadro como campo plstico autnomo.
A maneira como essas figuras eram pintadas
tambm evocava esse passado: surgiam quando eu
removia a ltima ou penltima camada de tinta,
nas cores das camadas anteriores. Olhando depois
de alguns anos para elas, ocorreu-me pensar que
realizavam assim uma espcie de encenao da
pintura, de um espao um pouco solene da pintura,
e que isso nascia do desejo de um artista jovem
procurando aproximar-se dessa linguagem to
impregnada de histria.
Depois, (e isso j estava no comeo da dcada de
noventa), querendo pintar de um modo que revelasse
menos os rastros da prpria pintura, que fosse mais
PAULO PASTA, Dentro e fora da pintura 67
DOSSI
a imagem de um cho de cacos de cermica (o cho do meu atelier), que formavam
um padro aleatrio. Em seguida organizei esses cacos como elementos autnomos,
o que me proporcionou novos arranjos formais. Passei ento a pintar acrescentando
a tinta, e no mais retirando-a, e penso que dessa maneira logrei conquistar um pouco
daquilo que ainda almejo: o presente, a presena.
As passagens tonais eram construdas pelo acrscimo sucessivo de camadas de
tinta, mas ficava difcil romper com o tonalismo geral, uma vez que eu queria faz-lo
pelo uso de uma segunda e terceira cor. (Nunca pensei minha pintura dessa poca
como monocromtica; essa caracterstica que ela adquiriu no foi escolha minha, foi
mais uma das muitas contingncias).
Depois de cinco anos trabalhando nessa direo, e buscando uma unidade
espacial maior e menos fragmentada, comecei a pintar o que parecia ser o espao
entre os arcos, (utilizados nos trabalhos anteriores onde as formas arquitetnicas
eram muito presentes), resultando essa pesquisa em imagens semelhantes a colunas.
As negaes, as reas escondidas das pinturas anteriores continuaram, mas, ao
terem o espao mais bem definido e estruturado por essas formas, as cores puderam
ento, variar. Com mais esse aspecto, penso que avancei na posse daquilo que nomeio
como presente, da aceitao dos contrastes presentes no real. A maneira como
pintava essas colunas tambm sofreu variao. Se antes, na srie dos cacos, usava
um pincel menor e prosseguia com ele construindo a trama pictrica por pequenas
pinceladas, nessa nova fase pude, pelas formas mais amplas, tambm aumentar o
tamanho do pincel e conseguir reas coloridas mais planificadas e uniformes.
Partindo dessas colunas, obtive um maior nmero de variaes. Novas
articulaes apareceram: do espao entre elas surgiu a forma de uma espcie de
lpis apontado; retirando a terceira coluna, eu tinha um vazio a ser aceso pela cor;
duas formas parecidas com garrafas (na verdade, o lpis, s que com a ponta mais
longa e arredondada), colocadas em simetria, fizeram aparecer entre elas uma outra
coluna, etc.
Paralelamente a essa pesquisa, comecei uma srie de trabalhos partindo da forma
de um pio, desses usados em brincadeiras infantis. Assim como aconteceu com os
cacos, o que apareceu no incio dessa nova seqncia foi a nfase nas formas, no
tema. Valorizava os pies, esquecendo um pouco aquilo que me interessa mais: a
ativao do espao onde as coisas esto, feito de cheio e vazio sempre entranhados.
Fazendo com que os pies e o espao viessem juntos, ou seja, ao mesmo tempo,
que comecei e estend-los at o limite da tela, criando assim, pela primeira vez,
formas grandes que no cabiam mais inteiras, nesses limites. Pude com isso descobrir
outras figuras entre os pies: ampulhetas, clices invertidos, etc., que vieram a se
transformar nos novos temas.
68 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Quanto mais elementos tenho para pintar, mais vejo possibilidades para o meu
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trabalho. Isso contradiz um pouco o que a maioria dos observadores aponta como
sendo a primeira coisa a se notar em minhas pinturas: a cor. Na verdade, penso que
foi devido a esta expanso das formas que a cor ganhou maior amplitude e fora.
Penso tambm, s vezes, que essa fora ou saturao de algumas cores que
emprego, viria para compensar as formas que se tornam difceis de serem vistas,
justamente por estarem mergulhadas nessa densidade cromtica. Essas formas-cor
tornam-se fortes, porm veladas. Talvez venha da o aspecto de conquista dura de
uma certa calma, de energia pulsante e escondida que possuem.
Quando penso na cor, tambm penso na forma (assim como tambm a cor
s existe em relao outra). No as dissocio na elaborao do trabalho. Sempre
gostei das cores que guardam luz, e nesse aspecto reconheo um ponto de unio
entre as pinturas anteriores e as atuais. Minhas cores so compostas, vm de uma
paleta derivada, isto , so cores feitas a partir da paleta fsica, das cores fsicas. Gosto
delas quando abandonam suas caractersticas mais industriais, quando passam pelo
processo da experincia, quando podem vir a se transformar em outras, quando se
modificam pela vizinhana, quando somaram e sofreram mutao. Costumava usar a
metfora da fruta para caracteriz-las. Fico satisfeito quando acredito que os quadros
amadurecem na minha frente. Uma fruta tambm atinge o ponto mximo de saturao
de cor e sabor quando est no limite, quando no dia seguinte j vai apodrecer. Uma
cor passa assim como uma fruta passa.Gostaria que minhas cores tivessem algo
anlogo a isso, que fossem ao mesmo tempo intensidade e despedida, casamento de
beleza e extino.
No seria exagero pensar que as formas que emprego agora no meu trabalho so
transformaes, uma espcie de lenta transformao das formas que primeiramente
ocuparam e constituram meu fazer, e que foram descritas aqui. Nesse sentido posso
dizer que possuem uma origem, ou melhor, posso deduzir de onde vieram. Penso
tambm que esse fato isolado no seria suficiente para explic-las, como tambm
sei que essa vontade de coerncia e organicidade muitas vezes poderia ir contra
uma condio mais arejada da pintura. Mas j tive mais apreo por esse aspecto do
meu trabalho. Parece-me que hoje estou mais distante das origens, e, portanto, meu
trabalho parece tambm pedir menos dessas foras que antes eram-lhe essenciais. O
novo e no a novidade seria a pergunta de todo trabalho, e de toda nova pintura,
e essa pergunta, acredito, adquire aqui uma natureza problemtica, justamente porque
esse trabalho parece tambm querer estruturar a surpresa, ou preveni-la.
Penso tambm que as passagens, tanto de uma cor a outra, de um tema a outro,
como tambm de uma condio a outra, seria um dos vetores mais importantes
para compreender o que fao. Passagens ocasionariam, invariavelmente, mudanas
e transformaes. Agora, como transformar e mesmo assim poder me reconhecer
PAULO PASTA, Dentro e fora da pintura 69
DOSSI
Sem ttulo, 1997
180 x 220 cm
leo e cera sobre tela
Coleo Museu de
Arte Moderna de So
Paulo
no que fao? Talvez venha disso meu apego a sries, aos desdobramentos de formas
semelhantes, e o desejo de que todo trabalho seja tambm uma espcie de testemunho
do que foi vivido.
Olhando para a minha pintura atual, noto que ela foi progressivamente
abandonando uma espcie de interioridade, de essncia, para se tornar mais fluida
e gil. No possuo muita identificao com as linguagens artsticas, ou as pinturas,
que fazem das reiteraes da superficialidade do mundo, uma crtica a esse mesmo
estado do mundo. Nesse sentido, apesar de saber avaliar sua importncia, sempre tive
um trato mais difcil com a Pop Art. Prefiro os trabalhos nos quais esse lugar seria
apontado pela sua falta, no pela ostensiva presena. Quando consigo criar esse espao
nas minhas pinturas essa espcie de vazio reconheo neles os mesmos contedos
dos trabalhos iniciais, aqueles de maior influncia do movimento metafsico, s que
agora essa condio seria dada mais pela construo formal e menos pela figurao.
Meus trabalhos ganharam essas qualidades que chamei de fluidez e agilidade, por
volta de 2004. Posso identificar vrios fatores que colaboraram para isso. Lembro que
vi com muito interesse a sala de Sean Scully na Bienal de So Paulo de 2002. Eram
pinturas de grandes formatos, de composio decidida e plana, em que era deixada s
cores a grande tarefa de construir a luz, a qual surgia tanto por meio das justaposies
como tambm das sobreposies entre elas, alcanando assim, o pintor, uma superfcie
70 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
me lembrou o exemplo de Matisse. Lembro-me tambm das telas dentro das telas,
ou seja, pequenas telas inseridas dentro de uma maior, como se quebrassem essa
referida harmonia, ao mesmo tempo em que parecia repor a pergunta pelo tema da
prpria obra: a pintura dentro da pintura.
Em 2004 tomei contato tambm com os livros do escritor sul-africano J.M.
Coetzee. Li vrios dos seus romances com muito interesse, e tambm impressionado
com a maneira com que o escritor conseguia transformar a literatura em seu prprio
tema. Muitas vezes o seu narrador, colocado em terceira pessoa, era tambm um
escritor ou crtico literrio, duplicando assim a narrativa, tornado-a muito forte
e ambgua. Evitaria o termo metalinguagem, nos dois casos, o do pintor e o do
escritor, por acreditar que ambos procuram se colocar em um lugar diferente disso.
Para mim, como se ensaiassem sobre o eterno e recorrente tema da pergunta pelo
sentido do fazer, tornando o prprio trabalho essa fico. (O oco do trabalho, para
mim, sempre foi a pergunta pelo que pintar).
Tambm em 2004, apresentei uma srie de pinturas, nas quais empreguei vrias
formas semelhantes que denominei de vigas. Na verdade, esse nome me ocorreu
porque essas formas sugeriam vigas de construo, onde uma vertical sustentava
uma horizontal. Dentro dessas vigas maiores, a vertical e a horizontal fazendo um
arranjo ortogonal , inseria uma menor, como se elas se reproduzissem, ou como
se uma pudesse conter a outra, sugerindo, assim, que o tema nascia do tema, ou
que o espelhasse. Como disse, isso me foi sugerido pelos dois exemplos de artistas
citados acima.
Procedendo desse modo, pude tambm variar as espessuras, os lugares e
propores dessas vigas. Como elas organizavam melhor o espao, deixando-o mais
dinmico, tambm minhas cores, penso, puderam ficar mais rpidas e contrastadas.
Quando a viga desceu, isso , quando a horizontal abaixou, a forma que surgiu foi a
de uma cruz. Pelo mesmo impulso, dupliquei-a tornado-a duas. Duas cruzes foi o meu
tema e o meu motivo durante cinco anos, e ainda hoje trabalho com desdobramentos
desta forma. Consegui com elas uma ativao maior do espao, tornando-o mais
plano e definido. Abandonei tambm uma construo apoiada somente na mo e
no pincel: se antes, construa as formas livremente, mo livre, hoje tenho a ajuda
de fitas adesivas para obter maior preciso. Esse aspecto tambm colaborou para
dotar esses trabalhos de uma maior mobilidade, ainda que sutil. O formato das telas
tambm aumentou, e por meio desse procedimento penso que pude repotencializar
aquela espcie de pudor da presena que sempre marcou muito meus trabalhos. O
mesmo penso sobre o uso da cor: se antes a latncia das formas as fazia vir envoltas
em morosidade, agora elas se aprontam mais rapidamente.
As ditas duas cruzes, desdobrei-as em trs. Hoje, esse espao criado por esses
PAULO PASTA, Dentro e fora da pintura 71
trs elementos foi simplificado: retirei algumas partes dessas figuras e esse vazio
DOSSI
preenchido pela cor. Nesse jogo entre figura e fundo, conforme j procurei descrever,
a cor o que preenche, criando assim um lugar ambguo para a pintura. Alias, foi
pensado nisso, nesse jogo constante, que iniciei uma srie de pinturas que denominei
de funmbulos. O nome, claro, foi sugerido pelo que traz de ambiguidade, ao remeter
ao equilbrio instvel entre uma forma e outra: funmbulo o homem que caminha
na corda bamba. Um certo funambulismo entre uma coisa e outra seria justamente
a zona de indeciso entre essas coisas, ou entre essas formas e cores. As formas
que emprego se parecem com as garrafas das pinturas anteriores, entre de p e
deitadas, fazem aparecer entre si outra forma, ao mesmo tempo fundo e figura, numa
constante permutao.
Entendo que no posso afirmar muitas coisas a respeito do meu trabalho. Afirmar
no sentido de procurar ter com ele uma relao distanciada, objetivando uma anlise
que me colocaria invariavelmente fora dele.
Poderia buscar uma soluo potica, uma escrita potica. Mas tampouco acredito
que essa forma lograria chegar a uma justa auto-observao. Procuro reconstruir
um pouco de sua histria interna, narrada por meio das suas formas. O seu sentido
mais amplo e completo, claro, me foge, e acredito que deva ser assim. Nessa chave,
acredito tambm que a minha pintura esta sempre minha frente, avanada em relao
a mim. O que consigo ver do seu sentido, so apenas aquelas particularidades que
me induzem ao fazer e o tornam possvel. No saberia, por exemplo, dizer melhor
do que j disse sobre a minha escolha de cores. Posso apontar com preciso a paleta
cromtica de alguns pintores com as quais possuo profunda afinidade: por exemplo,
Bonnard, Diebenkorn, Brice Mardem. Mas a paleta desses pintores no est dissociada
do que pintam. Os temas escolhidos, ou as solues formais por eles encontradas
no se dissociariam de uma expresso por essas cores especficas. Existe sempre,
para mim, uma afinidade muito grande entre o que pintam e como pintam. Em um
auto-retrato verde e malva de Bonnard, essas cores tambm seriam esse retrato. Elas
so a sua forma, uma vez que cooperam de modo fundamental no seu sentido. O
mesmo poderamos dizer de uma paisagem Ocean Park, de Diebenkorn. A paisagem
ali so as cores tambm. As cores constroem esse espao e so construdas por ele.
Acredito que tenha ficado claro que, para mim, o qu pintar tem que ter
uma correspondncia muito estreita com o como pintar. E acredito mais ainda na
fora e valor do trabalho quando esses temas surgem internamente, engendrados
e transformados pelos motivos anteriores, numa espcie de auto-alimentao. Um
motivo novo teria que ser filtrado, decantado pelo trabalho, at ser tambm absorvido
por essa espcie de sistema que busco construir. Mas aqui tambm valeria a pergunta:
qual sistema? No saberia responder, talvez porque isso me ultrapassa como produtor,
mas ele obedeceria mesma necessidade primeira de identificar a pintura, a minha
72 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
pintura, o seu tempo, com o tempo do vivido. A, ento, penso eu, no caberiam aes
DOSSI
Dezembro de 2010.
PAULO PASTA.
Nascido em Ariranha, So Paulo, em 1959. Pintor, desenhista, gravador e professor (pintura e desenho) no Departamento
de Artes Plsticas da Escola de Comunicao e Artes/USP. Formou-se em artes plsticas na ECA/USP em 1984. Em
2011, obteve doutorado em Artes pela mesma universidade. Desde o ano de 1984 tem apresentado seu trabalho.
O ttulo de sua tese A educao pela pintura, uma reunio de todos os seus ensaios j escritos na rea de
Artes. Esta monografia acompanhou uma exposio dos seus trabalhos mais recentes no Centro Mariantonia, em
maro de 2011.
RICARDO PERUFO MELLO, Rarefao: Paradoxos Imagticos 73
DOSSI
RICARDO PERUFO MELLO
RESUMO
Este breve ensaio foi elaborado a partir
da disciplina Processos Hbridos na Arte
Contempornea, ministrada pela professora
Sandra Rey no curso de Ps-Graduao
em Artes Visuais da UFRGS. Apresentam-se
algumas das principais ideias da pesquisa em
Poticas Visuais que est sendo desenvolvida no
doutoramento, com uma considerao pontual
sobre os conceitos de mestiagem e hibridismo
e sua aplicao como instrumentos tericos. O
trabalho da referida pesquisa abrange os meios
da fotografia (como produtor das imagens
que so, atravs de um minucioso processo
de trabalho, fielmente pintadas) e da pintura
(como resultado final) em suas interseces,
e tem nessa prtica como principal referencial
histrico o movimento do Hiper-Realismo.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Pintura contempornea. Mestiagem.
Hibridismo. Fotografia e imagem videogrfica.
74 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
DOSSI
cinematogrficas, fotografadas unicamente diante de uma tela de televiso. A fotografia
recorta um pedao, no campo total original, do tipo de cena especfico escolhido
para essa proposio: o close-up.
Os filmes utilizados foram retirados de um escoamento da intensa produo
cinematogrfica vertida ao longo das trs ltimas dcadas para o formato de vdeo
(nesse caso especfico, em formato VHS), e so denominados na pesquisa como filme-
excesso. Encontrados em lojas que comercializam refugos de videolocadoras, tais
vdeos situam-se no nterim dos desdobramentos prprios aos fluxos das imagens
atuais. Um panorama j familiarizado nos desdobramentos do fluxo das imagens
correntes que determina percepes consequentemente automatizadas.
De fato, a hiptese que a presente pesquisa tem como premissa a de que,
hoje, a experincia narrativa da maior parte de ns permeada e determinada pela
fotografia, pelo cinema e pela televiso em suas inseres e conjunes miditicas
ou, como pondera Paul Virilio, de acordo com as subsequentes eras dos diferentes
tipos de dispositivos imagticos1.
precisamente esse desdobramento, essa sobre-exposio, esse distanciamento
do olhar em relao percepo direta do mundo real e a sua respectiva representao
na pintura que tenho como ponto de partida na pesquisa que desenvolvo. Identifico
tal distanciamento traduzido no trabalho de alguns pintores contemporneos pontuais,
tais como Gerhard Richter e Chuck Close. Esta leitura baseia-se principalmente
(mas no apenas) no fato de tais artistas empregarem fotografias como alicerce para
constituio imagtica de suas pinturas.
Do ponto de vista dessa pesquisa, que busca lanar mo nos dias atuais de uma
pintura que copia a imagem de uma foto, a tcnica pictrica empregada por pintores
identificados com o movimento do Hiper-Realismo representa a culminao da
imbricao tcnica e histrica entre os meios da pintura e da fotografia. Isto porque
props uma radicalizao da sistemtica figurativa pictrica em sua aproximao
visual com o meio da fotografia (aparente e superficialmente correspondente
complexidade da realidade observvel) ao transpor para o plano pictrico uma imagem 1
fotogrfica considerando e atentando para todas as idiossincrasias da construo O autor institui como a era da
tica fotogrfica (tais como uma srie de assimetrias das figuras, alm de planos fora lgica paradoxal da imagem (na qual
estaramos atualmente inseridos)
de foco caractersticos da profundidade de campo). a que comearia com a inveno
A imagem fotogrfica apropriada no processo da referida pesquisa ento fiel, da videografia, da holografia e
da infografia. De acordo com sua
manual e minuciosamente copiada na pintura, ponto a ponto da retcula videogrfica,
classificao, esta seria posterior
atravs do processo de pintura que utiliza apenas tinta, pincis e suporte (tela). era da lgica dialtica (da fotografia
Porm, aqui o suporte utilizado (chapa de metal) mecnico e industrial, assim como e cinematografia) do sculo XIX, que
por sua vez posterior era da
a tinta (acrlica), alm do uso do projetor de slides que fornece a imagem fotografada lgica formal (da pintura, gravura e
como guia para a pintura. da arquitetura) (2002, p. 91).
76 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
DOSSI
Figura 1. Slides
fotogrficos que foram
utilizados para uma
srie de trs pinturas.
Figura 2. Imerso
noturna #061
(246 horas), 2007.
Acrlico sobre metal
galvanizado, 194 x
94cm.
DOSSI
o testemunho tangvel de uma realidade anterior, a pintura aqui considerada
inexoravelmente uma criao manual.
Instaura-se ento o estabelecimento de um paradoxo no qual a foto apropriada
do vdeo no privilegia o que foi visualizado. Isto , a re-apresentao do referente
cinematogrfico original (uma vez que invariavelmente as interferncias e rudos do
vdeo somam-se foto), mas sim a experincia visualmente imersiva ocorrida durante
o ato do registro videogrfico.
O referente dessa fotografia no o mesmo da cmera cinematogrfica (nesse
caso, o rosto dos atores), mas o prprio aparelho de TV, mais especificamente a tela
da televiso. O que ento a foto revela abarca no apenas um pedao da imagem do
filme, mas principalmente o momento de contato direto com a exibio do mesmo
no vdeo (minha ao como fotgrafo frente televiso num ambiente privado). Figura 3. Capas de
Conforme observado anteriormente, visando essa etapa processual, os filmes filmes utilizados para
apropriao de imagens.
de vdeo empregados para a captao das imagens utilizadas nessa pesquisa (figura
3) constituem uma condio aqui chamada de filme-excesso.
Nesse sentido, foram levadas em conta algumas especificidades: esses vdeos
no chegavam ao mercado brasileiro com um estatuto idntico ao de sua exibio
e comercializao em seu mercado cinematogrfico original (e, nesse caso, constitui
outra especificidade do objeto apropriado a sua origem norte-americana).
Em primeiro lugar, essa alterao no estatuto original que o filme possua
acontece devido disparidade quantitativa da enorme produo cinematogrfica
em relao ao mercado consumidor existente no Brasil. Era (e ainda ) comum que
a maior parte da totalidade de filmes cinematogrficos rodados nos Estados Unidos,
e exibidos l em salas de cinema, seja disponibilizada no Brasil apenas no formato de
vdeo (antigamente no formato VHS, atualmente em DVD). Justamente porque no
h quantidade suficiente de pblico consumidor brasileiro para tamanha produo
cinematogrfica.
Em segundo lugar, para que o mercado audiovisual nacional possa tornar possvel
a transposio de uma produo estrangeira de cunho narrativo para dentro do
mercado brasileiro, coloca-se a necessidade de traduo da lngua falada. Assim, o
filme original dublado por vozes que substituem as anteriores, ou acrescido de
legendas que igualmente traduzem para a lngua portuguesa cada frase falada pelos
atores, ou escritos que aparecem na cena. De maneira que, por mais sutis que tais
alteraes possam ser, em relao compreenso e interpretao do filme, notrio
que mesmo pequenas marcas e inseres provocam modificaes na integridade
semntica de qualquer obra visual ou audiovisual nesse caso.
Tais aspectos particulares no so entendidos aqui como arbitrrios. Ao contrrio,
parte-se do princpio que alm de impregnarem a imagem com caractersticas que
78 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
tambm sentidos polticos. Pois, tal como afirma Virilio, quem negaria hoje que a
PLIS, que emprestou sua etimologia palavra POLTICA, pertena ao domnio dos
fatos da percepo? (1993, p. 22). Sendo que o substantivo de origem grega plis
sinnimo de cidade entendida no sentido de comunidade organizada, formada
por cidados.
Parece ficar claro ento o papel intercultural que possui o cinema, e sua situao
no processo globalizador em que atuam fluxos das indstrias culturais em meio
aos mercados mundiais. Ademais, como refora Nstor Canclini, as modalidades
clssicas de fuso, derivadas de migraes, intercmbios comerciais e das polticas
de integrao educacional impulsionadas por Estados nacionais, acrescentam-se as
misturas geradas pelas indstrias culturais (2000, p. XXXI).
precisamente esse vasto mercado mundial instaurado pela indstria cultural
cinematogrfica que, como foi apontado anteriormente, fez surgir o que identifico
como filme-excesso.3 Um produto cultural bastante previsvel e repetitivo em suas
solues estticas e de roteiro, justamente por sua condio de produto elaborado
a partir de diretrizes prioritariamente mercadolgicas. Uma vez que
Tal tipo de situao, de tempos longos e que requer pacincia artesanal, que
intenciono no processo de trabalho da pesquisa. No no sentido de simplesmente
instaurar uma contraposio ao panorama contemporneo descrito acima, mas sim
como situao de trabalho inserida na lgica da referida noo de hibridao termo
que o autor entende por processos que combinam estruturas ou prticas que geram
novas estruturas, objetos ou prticas.
Apesar da meno ao conceito de hibridao, nesta pesquisa optei por abordar
seus cruzamentos imagticos entre diferentes mdias pelo vis do conceito de
mestiagem. Conceito que pressupe igualmente a ideia de uma mistura entre duas
entidades distintas e dissociadas em suas qualidades individuais, responsvel por
gerar uma terceira entidade que carrega aspectos das que a geraram. Apesar de,
em termos gerais, poderem ser considerados como conceitos correlatos, notrio
RICARDO PERUFO MELLO, Rarefao: Paradoxos Imagticos 79
DOSSI
cada um dos dois termos.
Por exemplo, enquanto o crtico Moacir dos Anjos entende que o conceito do
hibridismo sugere a impossibilidade da completa fuso entre componentes diferentes
de uma relao (2005, p. 28), sendo assim resultado de uma aproximao de
diferentes que no se completa nunca (p. 29). Enquanto que a terica Icleia Cattani
sustenta que
REFERNCIAS BIBLIOGRFICAS
ANJOS, Moacir dos. Local/Global: arte em trnsito. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Ed., 2005.
BARTHES, Roland. A cmara clara: nota sobre a fotografia. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 1984.
CANCLINI, Nstor Garca. Culturas hbridas: estratgias para entrar e sair da modernidade. So
Paulo: EDUSP, 2000.
CATTANI, Icleia Borsa (Org.). Mestiagens na arte contempornea. Porto Alegre: Editora da UFRGS,
2007.
LUCIE-SMITH, E. Art Now, from abstract Expressionism to Superrealism. New York: William Morrow
& Company, 1981.
RICHTER, G. Notas, 1964-1965. In: FERREIRA, G.; COTRIM, C. (Org.). Escritos de artistas: anos 60/70,
Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar, 2006.
VIRILIO, Paul. A mquina de viso. Rio de Janeiro: Jos Olympio, 2002.
___________. O espao crtico. Rio de Janeiro: Editora 34, 1993.
TEXTOS
A BIENAL DA
DESGLOBALIZAO
RESUMO
A partir da ideia de que processos de globalizao
aproveitam os movimentos globais para criar
infra-estruturas que fortaleam as bases locais,
saindo do marco imaginrio das identidades
nacionais, o autor analisa a Bienal de Artes
Visuais do MERCOSUL, 2011. Enfoca a proposta
curatorial centrada em Geopoticas como um
questionamento dos conceitos de nacionalidade
e de centro/ periferia.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Globalizao. Desglobalizao. Bienal Mercosul.
Geopoticas.
82 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
TEXTOS
A BIENAL DA DESGLOBALIZAO
Por que deve haver uma Bienal do Mercosul se no existe uma arte mercosulista?
Artistas e crticos da Argentina, do Brasil, do Paraguai e do Uruguai questionaram
inclusive quanto a se falar de arte nacional nesses pases. Soa como uma discriminao
que em bienais e feiras das metrpoles se interpretem as obras de Guillermo Kuitca
ou de Cildo Meireles mais do que por suas contribuies estticas tal como se faz
com artistas ingleses ou alemes medindo de que forma representam suas culturas
nacionais de origem.
Paradoxos deste tipo motivaram que na 8 Bienal do Mercosul, que se desenvolve
de 10 de setembro at 15 de novembro de 2011, seu curador Jos Roca elegesse
como eixo conceitual a geopotica. Nascida em 1997 para acompanhar a integrao
econmica dos quatro pases citados, a Bienal logrou posicionar Porto Alegre no
foco internacional. A princpio foi criticada por exibir sobretudo o que se faz no
Brasil, ou pela dificuldade de representar artisticamente esse processo de integrao
regional. Depois de ter estado na 5 edio e de seguir seu processo, vejo que se abre
agora a todos os continentes sem repetir os esteretipos do mainstream artstico
e acadmico.
Como a prpria ideia de bienal questionada, depois de um sculo de desgaste
e por sua recente proliferao mundial (cerca de 200), o catlogo comea anunciando
o que esta bienal no : nem uma enciclopdia aonde so ilustrados conceitos, nem
um arquivo para exibir retricas curatoriais ou documentar experincias que no
podemos ver, nem uma feira de tecnologia na qual vai-se para olhar as surpresas que
os museus ainda no compraram.
Tambm percebemos que se distancia das simples oposies binrias (centro/
periferia, Norte/Sul) e da exaltao ps-moderna de um nomadismo que descuidava
das diferenas e desigualdades. Qual a geopoltica desta Bienal? Quer se perguntar
novamente quais seriam hoje experincias no ingnuas de nao, territrio e
revoluo.
Um primeiro assombro que oferece a mostra a abundancia de bandeiras:
acumuladas, desconstrudas, ironizadas, mas cuja insistncia por si s desafia o lugar-
Artigo tambm publicado na Revista
do Jornal Clarn, em 2 de novem-
comum segundo o qual a globalizao haveria enclausurado o nacional. Francis Alys
bro de 2011. apresenta dois velhos anncios de bandeiras mexicanas com indicao do lugar aonde
NSTOR GARCA CANCLINI, A bienal da desglobalizao 83
TEXTOS
representao, sobre a outra idntica espetculo.
Display de propriedades o ttulo de uma das peas mais potentes: Leslie Shows
colou no alto umas trinta bandeiras brancas das quais jorram cores, insignias e elementos
grficos. Como estandartes que se derretem e j no podem comunicar identidades
compactas. Os fragmentos que se podem ler deixam ver rastros de bandeiras de
pases e marcas geogrficas ou sinais de trnsito: o nacional, o geolgico e o urbano.
Outra parede enorme est coberta por uma bandeira negra, intitulada Cu,
obra de Luis Romero, que recolhe apenas sis, luas e estrelas de muitas bandeiras
bordadas em fio branco. Nem faixas, nem escudos, nem hericas insignias polticas;
to somente uma constelao aonde o que divide omitido. Ainda que o artista
diga que alguns espectadores lhe pediram para eliminar smbolos que se refiram a
identificaes religiosas, como sinal de intolerncia e, quem sabe, ao mesmo tempo
de desejo de um imaginrio firmamento beatfico aonde no seja necessrio se
importar com as diferenas.
Paola Parcerisa exibe uma bandeira paraguaia esvaziada, na qual apenas as bordas
de cada faixa esto marcadas por sutis fios de cor. Ficam os limites liberados da
contundncia e do emblema central. Averguo: como foi recebida no Paraguai? As
pessoas em geral a conheceram quando a levei para a Bienal de Veneza. Meu filho
de 14 anos, quando estava fazendo-a, perguntou: para uma partida de futebol?
Quando a terminei e s se viam as bordas, entendeu assim o sentido de cada faixa
ficar branca: foram-se todos.
As migraes e as fronteiras estiveram no centro da discusso poltica e visual
sobre o que fica das naes. Os deslocamentos massivos e as represses fronteirias
alimentam, s vezes, representaes melodramticas ou panfletrias. No extremo
oposto, incitaram obras que reduzem a interculturalidade ao nomadismo, uma
circulao fluida de pessoas e mensagens que dissolveria as diferenas.
Alguns artistas combinaram os emblemas nacionais com a iconografia
transnacional, como fizeram Melaine Smith e Rafael Ortega em Estdio Asteca. O
vdeo mescla imagens patriticas, pr-hispnicas, de um dolo da luta livre, da arte
contempornea e da bebida mais famosa, compostas por centenas de jovens que
levantam tabelas como mosaicos somados: sugerem no somente o que dizem
as imagens mas tambm o controle social disciplinar e sua contraditria ou falida
realizao. Uma grande tela de estdio, no alto da tribuna, tendo nas margens
logotipos da Coca-Cola e da cerveja Corona, declara: The Revolution will not be
televised. Como ao mesmo tempo esta obra representa o Mxico na Bienal de
Veneza, diz que a tarefa do embaixador que s vezes se encarrega da arte se cumpre
melhor se assume os smbolos histricos entretecidos com a iconografia desportiva,
comercial e miditica.
84 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
do Leste europeu ao final desta dcada, Argentina em 2001), mas nos ltimos trs
TEXTOS
anos o desmoronamento se mundializa, a Unio Europeia exibe sua incapacidade para
sustentar a integrao e os Estados Unidos se assoma uma e outra vez ao precipcio.
Samos do Euro?, perguntam-se os ministros europeus. Como proteger-nos do
contgio universal? E do avano chins? Outras dvidas semelhantes assinalam uma
tendncia desglobalizao. Os pases do Mercosul, sobretudo a Argentina, o Brasil
e o Uruguai, que conheceram h poucos anos os riscos do abismo, esto entre as
economias com melhor ritmo de crescimento anual (7 a 9 %), se expandem cuidando
do desenvolvimento interno e conseguem alguma redistribuio econmica e cultural.
Evidentemente, as artes no so reflexo dos processos econmicos ou
polticos. De fato, esta Bienal rene obras recentes e de anos anteriores, com uma
reflexo de longo prazo. O movimento internacional da arte, com muitos focos de
desenvolvimento no somente nas metrpoles, rene agora olhares mais complexos
sobre as articulaes e fraturas mundiais, desde as revolues falidas at as marchas
dos indignados e desesperados do Egito (Revoluo, de Khaled Hafez). Diferentemente
daqueles que concebem uma bienal como desfile global das novidades da temporada,
a do Mercosul inclui uma mostra coordenada por Aracy Amaral, aonde artistas atuais
revisam as fronteiras geogrficas e culturais dos pases da regio, em dilogo com
gravuras, esculturas, pinturas de paisagem, objetos domsticos e mapas de expedies
que documentaram outras pocas.Vdeos, instalaes sonoras e fsicas, fotos de satlite
do Google Earth, retrabalham o sentido atual das Misses, as movedias fronteiras,
as mestiagens indgenas com portugueses, espanhis, africanos, italianos rabes e
judeus povoadores dessas terras.
O programa Cidade no vista, por outro lado, convocou artistas brasileiros e
de outras nacionalidades a intervir em espaos e edifcios pouco interessantes de
Porto Alegre: o Observatrio Astronmico, runas urbanas, o Viaduto Otvio Rocha,
tubos de PVC erguidos a dez pilares que amplificaram os sons do Aeromvel trem
urbano silencioso que se desloca pelo ar com a fora da presso do vazio e gera
reverberaes necessrias mas que ningum escuta. Santiago Sierra, ao contrrio,
buscou aturdir com seis alto-falantes que reproduzem os hinos nacionais dos pases
do Mercosul tocados ao mesmo tempo nos Jardins do Palcio Piratini, antiga sede
dos governadores portugueses.
No possvel citar nem a metade da constelao de oficinas e aes que
buscaram incorporar comunidades distantes e fazer circular artistas de outras
regies. Destaco o projeto pedaggico curado por Pablo Helguera. Em vez de
difundir informao, formou mediadores para que articulassem o carter processual
do trabalho artstico com jogos e reflexes do pblico. A investigao, a colaborao
e as tarefas de interpretao, constitutivas dos trabalhos artsticos contemporneos
eram incentivados tambm nos receptores. O curso prvio para mediadores
86 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
TEXTOS
ARTUR FREITAS
RESUMO
Realizada nos anos 1940 e 1950 e ainda hoje
pouco conhecida pela historiografia da arte
no Brasil, a obra do pintor paranaense Miguel
Bakun pode ser vista, entre outras coisas, como
uma forma legtima porque potica de
problematizao da dicotomia entre acadmi-
cos e modernos no contexto brasileiro. Ora
adotada pelas foras modernistas de Curitiba,
ora premiada nos sales acadmicos da poca,
a produo paisagstica de Bakun representa
uma fratura no entendimento de arte que
ento circulava a sua volta o que certamente
interessante para uma compreenso ampliada da
arte brasileira da primeira metade do sculo XX.
PALAVRAS-CHAVE
Miguel Bakun. Arte brasileira. Modernismo.
88 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
TEXTOS
O problema-Bakun
se restringe ao que visto e comprado atravs das vitrines de umas poucas lojas da
TEXTOS
rua XV, no centro da cidade. J a consagrao dos artistas, via de regra temperada
com o sabor das brigas domsticas, fica a cargo das premiaes dos dois sales anuais
disponveis, o Salo Paranaense, criado em 1944, e o Salo da Primavera, de 1947. A
crtica de arte, por sua vez, demonstra mais boa vontade que compreenso plstica, 2
escorregadia e informe, aquele desenho impreciso e aquela espacialidade achatada, Sobretudo da crtica regional,
representa uma fratura no entendimento de arte que ento circulava a sua volta. bom que se diga. Fora de Curitiba,
o caso mais relevante ocorreu em
Generalizando, poderamos dizer que a Curitiba de Bakun, no af de modernizar-se, 1948, quando o crtico Srgio Milliet
dispe os termos do eterno conflito entre acadmicos e modernos de maneira demonstrou alguma simpatia com
a obra de Miguel Bakun. MILLIET,
que a pintura de Miguel Bakun pode ser reconhecida, mas no entendida. De um
Srgio. Artistas do Paran. O Estado
modo esquemtico, a Curitiba dos anos 1940 e 50, entre mil idas e vindas, tende a de So Paulo, 06 fev. 1948.
contrapor duas foras contrrias: o legado do pintor noruegus Alfredo Andersen,
no lado acadmico, e a presena forte do pintor italiano Guido Viaro, no lado 5
moderno. Diante dessa polarizao que de algum modo, sinaliza problemas mais Por volta de 1950, Bakun foi contra-
genricos da pintura brasileira , a obra de Bakun surge sempre desencaixada e tado pelo governador Moyss Lupion
para executar vrios painis em sua
inevitavelmente mal-compreendida o que, alis, no deixa de ser uma virtude, se residncia. O projeto, que durou
soubermos situar a obra do artista diante desses dois plos. muitos meses para ser finalizado,
90 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
TEXTOS
Bakun, por seu lado, encontra-se em meio ao fogo cruzado e tem dificuldade de se
situar. Adotado pelas foras modernistas, o artista tem uma fatura extica, meio
descontrolada, e um desenho que no se poderia chamar de correto; mas tambm
no deixa de ser um pintor da paisagem local um paisagista cujas pinceladas, mal- 7
TEXTOS
enquanto Armando Ribeiro Pinto nota a ausncia de estrutura arquitetural daqueles
quadros.16 Todos esto corretos; mas quela altura apenas Guido Viaro capaz de
perceber na carncia uma virtude. As pinturas de Bakun, afirma Viaro, ostentam uma
falta de desenho que parece mais um braso do que uma verdadeira falta; nelas, Popular, de Curitiba, Armando Ribeiro
conclui, elimina-se o ar das paisagens como se fosse uma experincia da fsica.17 Pinto afirma que no existe qual-
E verdade: em Bakun, eliminar o ar ou seja, dificultar a evocao atmosfrica quer forma de parentesco artstico
entre os dois artistas, assim recusan-
de um espao profundo e naturalista algo que se d precisamente na falta de do, portanto, uma comparao que,
desenho, no manejo da matria pictrica, e no na deformao linear de planos e j naquela poca, algumas pessoas
contornos, tpica da chave modernista. menos avisadas tm pretendido ver.
Dois anos depois, em 1948, o prprio
Particularmente feliz a esse respeito o caso de uma diminuta paisagem de Srgio Milliet se refere ao tempera-
Bakun, pintada sobre carto e datada de quatro de julho de 1946.18 Nela j esto mento vangoghiano de Bakun. Em
data indefinida, provavelmente em
presentes alguns dos principais expedientes poticos do artista. Pintado em suporte
fins dos anos 1940, o crtico Nelson
precrio, o quadro, que representa uma casa isolada em meio paisagem, apresenta Luz apresenta a Bakun um livro
um tratamento desenvolto que contrasta com as dimenses reduzidas do carto. ilustrado com imagens da obra de
Van Gogh. Segundo o crtico, Bakun
Embora assinada e datada, a pintura lembra um ensaio um daqueles esboos se impressiona e diz ver no artista
rpidos e inacabados a que a tradio recomendaria ampliar com mais apuro num holands um grande. Nos anos
suporte maior e definitivo. Para Bakun, no entanto, a incompletude j ela mesma 1990, a apresentao de Bakun como
Van Gogh do Paran se generaliza
uma fonte completa de significao. Sempre figurativo, o artista parece confiar na na imprensa. Sobre o assunto: Miguel
capacidade de leitura visual do observador, j que via de regra lhe confia um papel Bakun: 29 anos sem o Van Gogh do
Paran. Jornal do Estado, Curitiba, 22
fev. 1992; Miguel Bakun, o Van Gogh
do Paran. Gazeta do Povo, Curitiba,
23 fev. 1992; Miguel Bakun, o Van
Gogh do Paran, Curitiba, Correia
de Notcias, 22 fev. 1992; MILLIET,
Srgio. Artistas do Paran. O Estado
de So Paulo, 06 fev. 1948; PINTO,
Armando Ribeiro. Miguel Bakun: um
inspirado. Dirio Popular, Curitiba,
02 out. 1946.
13
a clareza descritiva de suas pinturas acabe entrando em conflito com uma espcie
de fatura a que eu gostaria de chamar de ostensiva, pois disposta justamente a
ostentar os vestgios do seu prprio fazer.
Nesse quadro de 1946, por exemplo, o horizonte, que relativamente alto,
acaba dividindo a paisagem em dois padres distintos de fatura ostensiva. O primeiro
deles, mais tmido e situado no tero superior da composio, consiste numa rea
azul esbranquiada que mais uma forma de cobrir o suporte que propriamente
um modo de evocar, por exemplo, a infinitude celeste. Ali, as pinceladas, visveis e
esticadas sobre si mesmas, no se unem pelas injunes de um efeito visual: elas
nascem por necessidade de cobertura, como se aquela rede de azuis e brancos
no fosse realmente necessria apario de um cu na pintura. Por outro lado,
14 abaixo do horizonte, o processo se inverte: em relao ao suporte, no se trata mais
LUZ, Nelson. IV Salo Paranaense. de escolher entre cobri-lo ou deix-lo vista; o que interessa, na pintura daquela
O Dia, Curitiba, 28 dez. 1947.
em supervalorizar essa produo, vegetao, justamente a interao, turbulenta e vibrtil nesse caso, entre tinta
sobretudo em funo da possibilidade e carto. Nessas circunstncias, placidez de um cu penteado pela tinta, Bakun
de se vincular tais imagens com a
contrape, no plano terrestre, uma natureza eltrica e ruidosa, que se constri na
biografia de um artista atormentado.
alternncia entre cobrir e mostrar, dando origem a um conflito de contrrios em que
o fundo, afinal, se faz cor e imagem. Entre espatuladas retorcidas de azuis, verdes e
15
NASCIMENTO, Osvaldo. No reino das brancos, o castanho cru do carto escapa nos intervalos da tinta e invade a paisagem,
cores. Dirio do Paran, Curitiba, reafirmando a fluidez dos objetos ali representados. No frmito das relaes entre
29 set. 1946.
massa e vazio, o desenho se dissipa em gesto, e no h limite visual que nos convena
dos limites das coisas que nos convena, por exemplo, que uma rvore ou moita
16
acabe aqui ou comece ali.
PINTO, Armando Ribeiro. Miguel
Bakun: um inspirado. Dirio Popular, Portanto, assim que o artista nos oferece, numa s pintura, duas formas de
Curitiba, 02 out. 1946. ostentar a fatura: de um lado, por ocultamento, como num cu-de-cobertura, que
nesse caso menos uma viso do infinito que um modo de cobrir com tinta um
17 pedao de suporte; e de outro, por disperso, como no caso da vegetao turbulenta
VIARO, Guido. Bakun. Joaquim, n 05, da paisagem, que aqui corresponde ao efeito vibrtil que resulta de procedimentos
Curitiba, out. 1946.
nervosos, incompletos e por isso mesmo permeveis apario ostensiva do suporte.
Ainda sobre esse, digamos, efeito dispersivo da paisagem, outra pintura
18
importante a Entrada do tanque do Bacacheri, tambm dos anos 1940.Trata-se de um
Cerca de apenas dez por cento das
pinturas de Bakun so datadas, o pequeno leo sobre tela em que o artista representou os arredores do lago do bairro
que certamente dificulta a com- Bacacheri, em Curitiba, antigo ponto de lazer da cidade. Nessa obra, a superfcie
preenso de sua trajetria pessoal.
da gua, e no mais a vegetao, que domina a maior parte da pintura. O horizonte,
Entretanto, quando o artista datava
suas obras, o fazia, com rarssimas limite superior de uma estreita faixa de grama, mais alto que na pintura anterior e
excees, escrevendo na tela no relega ao cu uma fatia ainda menor da composio. Embora seja um lugar de lazer, a
apenas o ano, mas tambm o dia
e o ms em que havia concludo
paisagem est vazia de indcios humanos: no h construes ou personagens, salvos
o trabalho. trs pequeninos toques ambguos de tinta escura pessoas ou moitas? que se
ARTUR FREITAS, A natureza dispersa: Miguel Bakun 95
TEXTOS
Bakun, Entrada do tanque do Bacacheri, anos 1940.
destacam no centro do gramado ao fundo, prximos a uma moita maior. Como eixo
da pintura, a natureza interessa tanto a Bakun quanto o ato ostensivo de pint-la.
Nessa obra, o movimento da tinta assume agora um carter menos rebelde
e dramtico. Por outro lado, o sentido das pinceladas e espatuladas continua bem
visvel e se baseia num jogo sutil de oposies. Aos toques horizontais da gua e do
cu, dominantes na pintura, o artista contrasta uma srie de movimentos opostos:
traos verticais nos trs barrancos verdes, ao lado esquerdo; espatuladas diagonais
no campo amarelado ao fundo; e movimentos convulsos e imprevisveis nos dois
blocos escuros de rvores, direita e esquerda. Mesmo assim, no apenas o jogo
articulado e interno da tinta que d a essa pintura o seu ar bruxuleante. A luz, nesse
trabalho, no foi derramada sobre os objetos, como de praxe: ela simplesmente saiu
de dentro deles de dentro dos troncos e galhos, das gramas e nuvens, dos reflexos do
lago. Novamente, a alternncia entre tinta e suporte que evoca o tal carter vibrtil
da pintura, com a diferena que agora a vibrao luminosa, dispersa por todo lado,
irradia de dentro, do fundo, de trs das coisas, ou seja: vem do branco da tela. De certo
modo, como se nessa pintura o efeito dispersivo fosse parte de um lento trabalho
do olhar como se a ausncia constante da tinta no passasse de um pretexto para
a percepo desviada de troncos, galhos e nuvens, ou mesmo de reflexos, passagens,
96 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
TEXTOS
Natureza desviada
BAKUN, Miguel. s.t. Texto manuscrito dramtico ou do trgico. No nico depoimento conhecido do artista, um manuscrito
e datado, folha nica, frente e verso, de maio de 1960 que se encontra no Museu de Arte Contempornea do Paran,
com duas indicaes de datas: dia
Bakun afirma que sua concepo de pintura no estava no desenho, formas e cores.
28 de maio de 60 e Comeo do
ms de maio. Setor de Pesquisa O artista explica: em certo momento, comecei a procurar Deus e observei que
do MAC-PR. O documento, transcrito se encontrava nas flores, frutas e cores. Vida, luz e movimento so predicados que
na ntegra em diversos catlogos e
ressuscito em meus quadros.19 Considerada, assim, num registro delicadamente
artigos de jornal, geralmente tido
como uma pgina avulsa de um afetivo e religioso, a postura do artista mostra-se bem diferente, por exemplo, das
eventual dirio do artista. At onde posturas exemplares da chave romntica. Para ele, as emoes intensas do mundo
tenho conhecimento, contudo, tal
dirio no existe mais, se que
natural no dependem, por analogia, da expresso grandiloquente de paisagens
existiu algum dia. amplas, sublimes e eventualmente aterradoras. A beleza da natureza no est no seu
ARTUR FREITAS, A natureza dispersa: Miguel Bakun 97
TEXTOS
temperamento sabidamente retrado, pode-se dizer que Miguel Bakun incorporou
a timidez e o acanhamento do seu prprio meio de arte, mas para potencializ-lo
como virtude. Mal resumindo, poderamos afirmar que quanto mais as paisagens
do artista se desencaixam dos debates entre modernistas e acadmicos, tanto mais
elas encontram sua prpria espessura potica, como se para acertar uma vez fosse
preciso errar outras duas. Deslocado, portanto, diante de um contexto que ope
o desenho naturalista s solues grficas do modernismo, Miguel Bakun acaba
fechando-se numa espcie de liturgia da simplicidade. Nela, o belo natural, sintoma
inesgotvel da boa vontade da natureza com os homens, precisa ser saudado de
alguma forma, e o manejo pictrico de uma pequena paisagem no deixa de ser
um sintoma, precisamente, da boa vontade dos homens com a natureza. Avesso s
discusses sobre arte, o artista assume um empirismo quase ingnuo e parte para os
arredores de Curitiba, onde descobre a simplicidade de lugares invisveis, de trechos
indefinidos, meros fundos de quintal ou beiras de estrada. Com suas paisagens, em
resumo, Bakun constri uma iconografia singela, em que a plasticidade dos recantos
esquecidos tanto uma reao inconsciente ao meio de arte, quanto uma forma de
afinidade com o contexto buclico da Curitiba de Bakun.
Pintada em quatro de junho de 1947, Paisagem um bom exemplo dessa
aliana entre humildade naturista, pintura pictrica e iconografia singela, sobretudo
se tivermos em conta alguns procedimentos com que o artista enquadra, na pintura,
tais relaes. Ali, Bakun olha a natureza como quem divaga no vazio, olhando para
baixo, absorto, a meio caminho de concentrar-se entre o que tem diante dos olhos
e o que tem dentro de si. Representando um lago margeado por casas, Paisagem
mais uma das pinturas bakunianas de horizonte alto, daquelas que parecem comprimir
o cu como se ele fosse um coadjuvante necessrio ao protagonismo da natureza.
Na parte superior do quadro, quatro casas emparelhadas dividem um espao exguo,
onde cabem com justeza, espremidas num retngulo achatado que vai da vegetao
felpuda do horizonte aos limites reais da tela. Ao p das casas, uma faixa de terra
marrom-acinzentada, formada de espatuladas pastosas, atravessa a pintura de um lado a
outro, dividindo a composio em duas reas desiguais. Dali para baixo, todo o campo
da pintura agora dominado pela presena do lago, com seus barrancos e reflexos.
A gua, nesse trabalho, alm de dar o peso e a medida do campo visual do quadro,
tambm uma fonte de discreta instabilidade perceptiva. Entretanto, ao contrrio
da Entrada do tanque do Bacacheri, Paisagem no afirma tal instabilidade atravs da
alternncia entre tinta e fundo: mesmo quando visvel, a trama da tela no aparece de
modo sistemtico, e se restringe a alguns pontos das casas ou da terra. A estratgia,
enfim, agora outra, e consiste basicamente em explorar a ambigidade plstica do
espelho dgua.Valendo-se de um horizonte alto, Bakun aproveita a extenso do lago
98 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
e a fluncia dos reflexos, na parte inferior da pintura, para recuperar como imagem
TEXTOS
o universo prensado ou ausente da parte superior, como no caso do cu, das casas
e de algumas rvores. Tal recuperao, no entanto, nunca mera aplicao da lgica
reflexiva das imagens. Ao contrrio: como se a placidez daquela gua no estivesse
a servio da contemplao, mas sim da dvida.Vemos no lago, por exemplo, que trs
araucrias invertidas ressurgem como fantasmas e dominam a composio, ecoando
em suas copas a horizontalidade de quatro barrancos que logo acima emergem da
gua. Os troncos das araucrias avanam at dois dos barrancos, mas curiosamente
no prosseguem acima deles, como seria de se esperar. Entre os dois barrancos e a
terra firme, situada logo acima, os reflexos dos troncos das rvores simplesmente
desaparecem, como se as imagens aquticas se referissem a rvores total ou
parcialmente invisveis. No mundo dos reflexos, alis, a menor das trs araucrias
sequer tem tronco e parece flutuar num universo paralelo em que a gravidade no
vale e os espelhos no refletem.
Um pouco direita, tambm na gua, vemos as imagens invertidas de uma casa
branca e de uma rvore indefinida. Ao contrrio das araucrias, agora possvel
identificar na paisagem os objetos refletidos, pois encontramos no plano terrestre a
casa e a rvore correspondentes. Por outro lado, novamente, atravs da ausncia
e no da presena que Bakun embaralha o raciocnio naturalista. Como um espelho
brincalho, o lago parece ser capaz de escolher aquilo que vai ou no refletir. E de
fato: apenas uma das quatro casas se reflete na gua ainda que no mbito terrestre
todas estejam em linha e situadas mesma distncia do olhar. Na gua, a linearidade
do horizonte, que a princpio deveria determinar que tudo na paisagem nasce do
mesmo cho, torna-se instvel e desalinhada. O reflexo da rvore direita surge de
um barranco diferente daquele de onde sai a imagem refletida da casa. E isso para no
falar de toda aquela rea de gua situada entre os barrancos e a terra firme, onde o
azul refletido do cu ocupa justamente o lugar do reflexo do cho, que deveria estar
ali. Paisagem, em resumo, um belo exemplo de como, em Bakun, uma iconografia
singela, feita de simples excertos da natureza, no impede a confluncia de sentidos
instveis, como no caso de um cho que na gua se torna cu ou vice-versa.
20
TEXTOS
Miguel Bakun, Praa Tiradentes, anos 1940.
TEXTOS
um exemplo: todo o lado esquerdo dessa parede feito de uma nica, lquida e
certeira pincelada, que comea no comeo e termina no fim, onde tem que ser,
desfiando uma verticalidade amolecida mas curiosamente precisa quase uma cincia
exata do inexato. O mesmo, alis, encontramos em outros pontos da pintura, como
no prdio alto e ocre da esquerda, feito de pinceladas igualmente liquefeitas, precisas
e verticais, ou ainda naqueles quatro automveis estacionados na rua, pintados de
volteio, numa s virada.
Outra obra importante que trabalha com pinceladas fluidas, embora agora as
relacione com reas alternadas de empaste e tela crua, Porta dos sonhos, pequeno
leo sobre tela provavelmente pintado no incio dos anos 1950. Em certa medida,
essa pintura no apenas relaciona diversos procedimentos pictricos anteriores: ela
faz da prpria relao um assunto potico. Nela, o artista trabalha com um jogo de
aberturas e fechamentos, que no por acaso correspondem a faturas distintas mas
ARTUR FREITAS, A natureza dispersa: Miguel Bakun 101
TEXTOS
sem sermos vistos, de fresta em fresta, avanando na intimidade alheia. No campo do
imageado, estamos protegidos atrs de uma folhagem densa, que cobre, no campo
pictrico, e de modo circular, todas as bordas da tela, de cima a baixo. Logo adiante,
atravs da barafunda vegetal, vemos um detalhe de uma casa. Na parede de tbuas
corridas, uma pequenssima fatia do interior da casa escapa pela fresta de uma porta
indiscreta, entreaberta e logo nos damos conta: estamos bisbilhotando.
Porm, o que vemos de fato somente uma promessa do olhar.Toda a intimidade
da casa se resume a uma rstia de pinceladas mnimas e horizontais. Em contraposio,
notamos tambm a presena decidida e vertical das tbuas da porta. Como no
caso dos prdios e carros em Praa Tiradentes, estamos novamente diante de uma
geometria certeira mas instvel organizadamente lquida. A diferena agora o grau
de preciso. Em Porta dos sonhos, a porta da casa feita de uma matria incomum,
na qual ato e coisa se confundem: cada tbua um gesto e cada gesto uma tbua
numa situao alis que levada ao extremo logo frente, onde duas pinceladas
quase mgicas, retas como rgua, cortam o espao e se escoram na parede, sob a
forma de duas vigas magras.
Por outro lado, em contraste a esse mundo liquefeito mas civilizado, Bakun no
se contm e despeja ali em volta, no mundo selvagem da vegetao, um turbilho de
folhas e flores e matos e galhos que se embolam numa fatura brbara. Mais uma vez,
a relao entre o empaste da tinta e o fundo descoberto que agita a disperso da
paisagem. O choque entre as duas faturas a da casa, de um lado, e a da vegetao
que lhe envolve, de outro parece confirmar o choque entre dois mundos: a natureza
quer sim engolir os vestgios humanos, e est prestes a faz-lo. Como resultado, o
tratamento dispersivo do plano entra em conflito com o voyeurismo do olhar e tende
a tomar conta do enquadramento. Ostensiva como um muro rebocado, a fatura bruta
da natureza se espalha das bordas da tela para dentro e aplaina a pintura.
Embora no tenha nada de sistemtico, tal procedimento de achatamento
pictrico do campo visual perceptvel em outras pinturas dos anos 1950, como no
caso exemplar de Na clareira, pintada por volta de 1957. Nessa obra, todo o espao do
quadro invadido pela instvel oscilao da natureza. Num suave plonge, o horizonte
escapa pelo alto e nos obriga a olhar para baixo. O ngulo de fato um pouco estranho:
Bakun parece ter puxado a paisagem pela perna, como se fosse possvel derrubar toda
a cena, dobrando-a sobre o prprio plano da pintura. O cu, j espremido em outras
obras, agora nem cabe no enquadramento; resta apenas a disperso contnua de um
cho que rvore e folha e grama, tudo ao mesmo tempo. Como um estrategista
em combate, o artista no pinta uma tela: ele ocupa os espaos, avanando com sua
pasta turbulenta sobre cada centmetro do terreno. Quase no centro da tela, um
casal se movimenta com dificuldade, a meio caminho entre sentar-se na paisagem e
102 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
TEXTOS
TEXTOS
mas no se confundem com ningum. No deixa de ser curioso, portanto, que um
tratamento abstrato do plano e das formas derive justamente de uma aproximao
amorosa com a natureza. A contradio salta aos olhos: os padres ostensivos de
pinturas como Na clareira acabam se aproximando da abstrao informal; aquela
mesma abstrao que j em 1957 comea a ganhar os espaos institucionais e que em
seguida dominar os Sales Paranaenses de 1961 e 62, acentuando a crise da figurao
bakuniana. Mas uma crise, diga-se, que no de poesia, mas de entendimento potico.
Na Curitiba dos anos 1960, em resumo, Bakun j est morto antes mesmo de morrer.
ARTUR FREITAS
pesquisador em histria da arte, doutor e mestre em Histria pela Universidade Federal do Paran (PGHIS/
UFPR), graduado em artes pela mesma instituio (DEARTES/UFPR), professor adjunto da Faculdade de Artes do
Paran da Universidade Estadual do Paran (FAP/UNESPAR), professor do Programa de Ps-Graduao em Histria
da Universidade Federal do Paran (PGHIS/UFPR Mestrado e Doutorado), lder do grupo de pesquisa NAVIS
Ncleo de Artes Visuais (CNPq) e autor de Arte de guerrilha (Edusp, no prelo), Solar da gravura (Medusa, 2011) e
Tony Camargo (Berlendis & Vertecchia, 2011).
NOTAS DE LEITURA
ANTONIO VARGAS
Paisagem: desdobramentos e
perspectivas contemporneas,
organizao de Maria Amelia
Bulhes e Maria Lcia Bastos Kern
106 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
NOTAS DE LEITURA
como o extico e o primitivo. Por fim o autor nos leva s relaes latino-americanas
NOTAS DE LEITURA
entre paisagem e identidade ao analisar as transformaes produzidas neste conceito
artstico pela mquina, a indstria, as influncia indigenistas e, como no poderia deixar,
das temticas sociais. Alexandra Kennedy-Troya, por sua vez, apresenta um ensaio no
qual, com recorte entre 1850 e 1920 no Equador, busca evidenciar as relaes entre a
fico e as visualidades fundacionais com a ideia de territrio estando esta, relacionada
ao conhecimento da geografia e da agricultura local. Nacionalismo, latifndio, poltica,
literatura e artes visuais se mostram contaminados pelo territrio e sua topografia em
um ensaio que auxilia na compreenso do que se costuma chamar de identidade latino-
americana. E Claudia Vallado de Mattos vem a recordar o leitor da impropriedade
que supor que as crticas ambientais sejam um fenmeno contemporneo. A autora
evidencia tal afirmao ao explicitar as relaes de conhecimento de relevantes
artistas, polticos e intelectuais do Sculo XIX com os debates e crticas sobre os
danos ambientais que o progresso vinha causando sobre a flora local. Destaque para
Taunay e Arajo Porto-Alegre.
Na terceira parte, Poticas da paisagem, Maria Lcia Bastos Kern aborda
a paisagem na obra do uruguaio Torres-Garcia como memria-lugar e na obra do
argentino Xul Solar enquanto imaginrias e msticas. Com sua elegante redao,
extremamente interessante como a autora apresenta a fora do nacionalismo catalo
na concepo paisagstica de Torres-Garcia. De forma densa e didtica exposta a
influncia do Mediterranismo e do programa cultural de Eugenio DOrs assumidos pelo
uruguaio assim como, as influncias e distanciamentos religiosos do Crculo Artstico
So Lucas em sua concepo vanguardista. Tal exposio proporciona ao leitor uma
imerso histrica e geogrfica detalhada onde sequer as anlises artsticas esto
ausentes. Vincius Oliveira Godoy, por sua vez, procura demonstrar a constncia
da paisagem nos desenhos de Iber Camargo e os limites de suas possibilidades
representativas onde, paisagem e memria se fundem na construo da modernidade
artstica de um dos maiores pintores brasileiros. J Glria Ferreira analisa obras do
escultor norte-americano Walter De Maria evidenciando as associaes feitas pelo
artista entre o tema da paisagem e a percepo de uma realidade invisvel e espiritual.
Para isto, De Maria elabora uma concepo de obra de arte que seja capaz de conduzir
o observador a um grau de experincia possvel para recordar a potncia dos abalos
que percorrem a natureza como afirma autora. Maria Anglica Melendi, por sua vez,
em um texto com uma abordagem refrescante, nos fala de jardins como paisagens no
pintadas. Nos apresenta o Jardim de Bomarzo idealizado pelo prncipe Per-Francesco
Orsini (1513-84), cuja compreenso exige do visitante, no mnimo, conhecimentos
da poesia de Dante, Petrarca e Ariosto. Passa pelo Jardim de Monet vendo a relao
entre jardinar e pintar para concluir com Little Sparta, o jardim-poema criado em
meio ao pntano pelo poeta escocs Ian Hamilton Finlay.
108 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
leitor uma rica introduo que permite compreender como as produes artsticas
contemporneas criadas e desenvolvidas para ambientes digitais esgaram ainda mais
os conceitos de paisagem. Iliana Hernndez Garca investiga a heurstica dos espaos
virtuais imersivos sustentando que a vida artificial, ao contrrio da terrestre, se
apresenta como um sistema aberto sempre a pergunta e nunca a representao de
respostas j obtidas. Para isto a autora comenta propostas como a de Sommerer e
Mignonneau que exibem um sistema de formas orgnicas abstratas que se modificam
pelas aes dos seres humanos com o sistema computacional, o projeto OP_ERA de
Rejane Cantoni e Daniela Kutschat onde o corpo participante de mudanas que se
sucedem no espao a partir de um sistema de rastreamento de uma interface, e obras
de outros artistas como Maurice Benayoun, Jeffrey Shaw e Marcos Novak. Claudia
Paim e Ulises Ferretti abordam a paisagem desde o campo das experimentaes
sonoras de seus primrdios futuristas, passando por John Cage, Westerkamp &
Andra McCartney, Pierre Schaeffer, para deter-se em Duplo Coro obra deles prprios
concebida originalmente para o jardim do Departamento Municipal de guas e Esgoto
de Porto Alegre. Andr Parente, por sua vez, discute conceitualmente a paisagem do
espao ao ciberespao analisando as relaes entre o tempo (ou velocidade) e as
topologias evidenciando que o tempo por se constituir em unidade com o espao
ao ser alterado nas topologias amplifica atravs de heterotopias as possibilidades
de experincias e conhecimentos. Para ilustrar, o autor analisa projetos prprios e
de outros artistas como Jean-Luc Boissier, Matt Mullican e Monika Fleishmann. J
Sandra Rey aborda seu prprio projeto DesDOBRAmentos da paisagem: um processo
artstico com base na fotografia digital, no qual o conceito de deslocamento encontra-se
permeado por experincias, aes e experimentaes estabelecidas em determinados
territrios ou lugares. Nestas experincias, processo e projeto, independentes e
interdependentes, se definem no trajeto de uma prtica, do registro no apenas
do espao mas tambm das vivncias produtoras de arquivos cuja experimentao
geradora de imagens que amplificam e redimensionam os conceitos historiogrficos
da paisagem. No ltimo texto desta coletnea, Maria Amelia Bulhes, diferenciando
o simples deslocamento do ato de viajar, tece uma reflexo sobre a amplificao
do conceito de paisagem pelos modos contemporneos de apreenso visual dos
territrios micro e macroscpicos propiciadas por experincias e proposies da
arte contempornea. Como a autora procura evidenciar, estas experincias artsticas
com uma imagem numrica que foge da relao direta com os territrios geogrficos
abrem-se a transformaes em si mesmas pela presena do visitante. Tambm ficam
evidenciado as novas possibilidades relacionais com a paisagem propiciadas pela
arte contempornea atravs de propostas imersivas e do mergulho na imagem que
altera a relao do espectador com o ambiente, exemplificadas atravs das obras
ANTONIO VARGAS, Paisagem, desdobramentos e perspectivas contemporneas - Maria Amelia Bulhes e Maria Lcia Bastos Kern, organizadoras 109
de artistas como Nelson Max, Jean Boissier, Gilbertto Prado, Stephan Barron, Andr
NOTAS DE LEITURA
Parente, Michael Aschauer, Joseph Lefvre & Martina Koutnoyan, Adriaan Stellinwerff
e Lozzano Hemmer.
Assim, Paisagem, desdobramentos e perspectivas contemporneas, pela variedade de
abordagens se oferece ao leitor como um elegante prisma que permite no apenas
uma compreenso histrica de um dos conceitos e temas mais importantes da arte
ocidental como tambm de sua sobrevivncia e transformao nos dias atuais. Dos
diferentes olhares, fica uma convico que a relevncia da significao espiritual, social
e cultural da paisagem, bem como a sua atualidade, se d pela potncia simblica de
permitir ao homem sentir-se parte do mundo e assim, menos estranho e solitrio.
Por fim, cabe lembrar que o livro ainda trs um Dossi de imagens coloridas que
auxiliam a compreenso do nefito.
ANTONIO VARGAS
Doutor em Pintura(1992) pela Universidad Complutense de Madrid, realizou ps-doutorado (1996) na Universitat
de Barcelona. professor do Centro de Artes da UDESC e do PPGAV-UDESC. Artista visual com exposies no
Brasil e no exterior.
CADERNO DE VERSES
ENGLISH
113 GUSTAVO FARES
Painting in the Expanded Field
119 ICLEIA CATTANI
Poietic, Matter and Fields in the paintings of Karin
Lambrecht
127 MICHAEL ASBURY
Daniel Senise, 2892: Between being and nothingness, the
spectator
133 CARLOS ZILIO
Painting as a questioning
137 PAULO PASTA
Inside and Out of Painting
143 RICARDO PERUFO MELLO
Rarefaction: imagetic paradoxes
147 ARTUR FREITAS
Scattered nature: Miguel Bakun
155 ANTONIO VARGAS
Scenery, unfoldings and contemporary perspectives, Maria
Amlia Bulhes and Maria Lcia Bastos Kern, editors
FRANAIS
157 LIANE CHIRON
Mutation intime de la peinture dans la vido numrique
ESPAOL
165 NSTOR GARCA CANCLINI
Mercosur: la bienal de la desglobalizacin
GUSTAVO FARES, Painting in the Expanded Field 113
ENGLISH
between an art-object and an object-of-the-world escaped the sphere
of the aesthetic, and of art in general, to become a philosophical
problem. It was as if art had arrived to the realization of its own
essence, the knowledge through art of what art is and, in doing
so, it had come to a sort of closure (Danto. Transguration 107).1
Art entered, then, a stage that can be called post-historic or post-
PAINTING IN THE EXPANDED FIELD modern, a stage that seemed to liberate the artist and the art-object
Gustavo Fares from the functions that were suitable for them up to that point.
The second meaning of pluralism, as anything goes, characterizes
RESUME: The present essay questions at the same time it a failure on the part of the artist, the critic, and the art world
acknowledges the historical and logical conditions of existence of in general to seriously engage the subject at hand, i.e., art, in
painting as an expanded field. The expanded field of painting is order to make it play a relevant role in todays cultural debates.
presented using a Greimas rectangle that incorporates the notions This second understanding of pluralism becomes openly political
of uniqueness/reproducibility, multidimensional affine spaces, and when it deals with national versus international identities from a
history. The essay provides an understanding of the discipline and globalized cultural perspective. In such a cultural realm the hegemonic
of the art-works that make it possible to locate different artistic tendency of pluralism may be interpreted as expecting a return
manifestations taking place today in society. to primitive gestures and societal mores associated not so much
with Western forms of expression as with a certain exoticism that
KEY WORDS: Painting. Pluralism. Krauss. Greimas. Expanded field. transforms the visual arts of cultures that may be different from
ours into an anthropological enterprise (Foster 55). In other words,
Todays art-world can be characterized by what, for lack of better such a pluralism expects the Western rst-world to produce art
term, is called pluralism. The term pluralism designates at least and theory, while the rest of the world becomes a province that, at
two different tendencies. On the one hand, it signals the fact that best, produces art and theory limited to their own spheres of the
there are no dominant art styles these days and that to continue national and, at worst, offers cultural (raw) materials to be later
searching for a pure language in any visual medium can become a processed in the rst-world where academic/cultural value is added.
fruitless task. On the other hand pluralism is also used to describe Pluralism, in both senses of the term, as a variety of styles available
an attitude of anything goes that leaves qualitative concerns as well as an anything goes and neo-colonial attitude, has been
aside in favor of a kind of tolerance that accepts everything as recognized as a hegemonic cultural tendency, and I believe it is
equally valid. precisely that, one hegemonic cultural tendency, not a natural and
Arthur C. Danto proposes that the rst understanding of the term a-historical state of affairs. Critics such as Hal Foster and Fredric
pluralism is the result of the changes in the art world since the Jameson have identied this, in appearance, free from societal and
1960s. In his view, starting in that decade, the crisis of the art-object historical factors tendency as the cultural logic of late capitalism
assumed wide-spread dominance. This was for Danto especially the (Jameson), a logic based on the means of (cultural) production
case in the work of Andy Warhol, who made evident the problem exported from the West to other latitudes (Foster). Robert Morgan,
with/of art. That problem is no other than distinguishing the art- in turn, acknowledges the presence of pluralism in the art world
object from the objects-of-the-world. When the artistic object came and proposes a way to distinguish between a symptomatic kind
to be considered as neither superior nor inferior to objects in the of art from another he calls signicant. The former is a sort
real world but too similar to them to allow for a visual distinction of spectacle in the sense given to the term by Guy Debord, a
fashion-world related event rather than an artistic one, closely criture or post-modernism (219). He does so through the expedient
ENGLISH
associated with the neo-colonial understanding of pluralism. In of a historicized Greimas rectangle, itself a systematization of the
contrast to the spectacle, the kind of art which is signicant semantic space (254).2 The use of the Greimas rectangle allows
tends to be more intimate, as well as associated to a powerfully Jameson to get into Conrads text by taking into account what the
thought idea (Morgan 96) which can be expressed in a variety of bipolar terms in the rectangle reveal about what is repressed in
styles and forms. In addition, a signicant art may also present and by the text. In other words, the tension between the realized
the possibility of embodying a place of resistance against the notion and unrealized terms of activity and value in Jamesons reading
that all culture is predetermined and lacks originality, and it is of Conrad make it possible to get into the political unconscious
therefore interchangeable and necessarily ephemeral. of the text and to reveal the logical and ideological centers a
The myriad of styles and objects that populate the art-world, together particular historical text fails to realize, or on the contrary seeks
with the tendency that accepts everything as valid and predetermined, desperately to repress (49). For Jameson, the social contradictions
in other words pluralism have given many a critic pause and that appear addressed and resolved by the modernist text are, in
impelled him/her to declare art over, even dead. Within this rather fact, an absent cause, which cannot be directly or immediately
grim perspective, almost no other discipline has endured as much conceptualized by the text (82). These social conditions addressed
suspicion and negative criticism as painting, especially in the last and repressed by Conrads text are expressed on the one hand as
twenty years. Whereas it is taken for granted that art in general, an acknowledgement of the reication of daily life and, on the
and painting in particular, do not enjoy the widespread cultural other, as a Utopian compensation for everything reication brings
resonance they had for four hundred years or so, this recognition with it (236). The modernist text, both as ideology and Utopia,
does not, however, necessarily imply that, since almost no one is becomes perceptually more abstract and detached from its referent
paying attention, the whole enterprise should go by the wayside. throughout the twentieth century and, particularly, from the 1960s
One of the ways to avoid an early dismissal of art in general, and on.3 When the modernist text strives also to stand beyond history,
of painting in particular, can be found in a kind of critical and it becomes not just an ambivalent modernist artifact but a post-
self-conscious gesture present in certain readings of verbal and/or modernistic one. As such, it tries to deny its historical conditions at
visual texts. Such a gesture, I propose, could help locate painting the same time it takes history as a ruin, a eld to be excavated
in its historical and logical contexts, while also providing a way of and used as if the choices offered and taken were of no consequence
thinking about the discipline in the current cultural arena rather other than aesthetic. Pluralism is another word for this denial. In
than advocating or predicting its early dismissal or its death. To opposition to the illusion of staying beyond history, Jameson reads
locate painting historically and logically I would like to trace a Conrads modern text revealing its conditions of existence, its
parallel between Fredric Jamesons reading of a literary text, Rosalind
Krauss considerations on sculpture, and my own understanding of
painting as it relates to other artistic manifestations. Jameson reads
2
a modern literary text, Joseph Conrads Lord Jim, using the Greimas The model Greimas proposed is an adaptation of an early formulation, also
rectangle in a way similar to Krauss reading of sculpture in her, now called a Klein group when employed in mathematics, or a Piaget group in
famous, essay on the sculpture in the expanded eld. I propose to the human sciences.
use the Greimas in a way similar to Jameson and Krauss in order
to advance an understanding of painting as a eld which can be 3
Granted, the push for a disembodied eye, for an observer and consumer of images
enriched and expanded by three elements: the notions of uniqueness/
rather than an actual body that looks at them, had been evolving for quite
reproducibility, the expedient of mathematical affine spaces, and some time, particularly since the mid-nineteenth century, and especially since
history. The result of the proposed understanding of painting will the advent of photography and the multiplication of images and image-making
be an expanded eld that allows us to better conceptualize the machines (Crary 12). This disembodied eye, rightfully criticized by Duchamp as
logical structure and historical development of the discipline in a the realm of the retinal, still needed embodied meanings (Danto 181), i.e.
art works, to contemplate. The des-embody-ment of painting is very much in
pluralist art-world.
vogue still, specially in the digital realm where painting has become a virtual
In The Political Unconscious Fredric Jameson studies Conrads Lord experience, to the point that some critics can say that the next Whitney Biannual,
Jim not as an early modernist text but as an anticipation of for instance, might as well be virtual the next time around (Rush 43).
GUSTAVO FARES, Painting in the Expanded Field 115
social and historical grounding and that which is repressed and/ proposes may be useful. But it also seems possible to consider the
ENGLISH
or hidden by the text.4 terms Krauss suggests not as qualitatively opposing one another but
The bipolar opposites organized by Greimas semantic rectangle that as the polar extremes of the same realm. In other words, they are
serve Jameson to determine the logical and ideological dimensions not opposed to one another because they have nothing in common,
of a (literary) text are also the basis for Rosalind Krauss classic but rather because uniqueness is at the other end of the spectrum
essay Sculpture in the Expanded Field. Therein the notion of from reproducibility. By conceptualizing these terms as belonging to
historicity appears once again, as it did in Jamesons analysis, a spectrum, we are able to accept and call for intermediate stages
as an element added to the Greimas rectangle. Krauss refers to between these two absolutes. I would indeed like to use Krauss
historicity not just or not even in the sense of genealogy or uniqueness/reproducibility dimensions, but given that they belong
lineage, but as an organizing praxis, in her case of sculpture, that to the same realm rather than to opposite ones, I propose to
can assume different logical stages over time. In sculpture, these incorporate rst a different pair of bipolar terms into the Greimas
different stages, as Krauss sees them, expand the concept of the rectangle: three-dimensionality and movement, two aspects painting
praxis associated with the monument by confronting it with two lacks. These two characteristics in their negative iterations can be
negatives, two things sculpture is not, a landscape and a building. In organized in relation to painting as follows:
her article, Krauss identies artistic practices that call into question
no-movement not-3D
the status of sculpture as monument. As a result of this challenge,
Krauss proposes that the notion of sculpture has grown since the
eutral term (painting)
1960s, both in practical and in logical terms, to designate areas of
art activities not previously recognized as associated with sculpture. Movement and 3D are two different aspects not present in painting,
Such areas include land art, marked sites, quasi-architectural pieces, since painting itself, the neutral term in the diagram, could be said
and the works of artists as diverse as Nauman, Serra, De Maria, to partake of none of those elements. In other words, painting, as
Morris, Smithson, Irwin, or LeWitt.5 understood in a classical way, cannot have movement nor could it
Jamesons reading of Conrad and Krauss reading of sculpture be three dimensional in any relevant way, other than by having
through the use of the Greimas plus history reveal the conditions some thickness in terms of texture since, otherwise, it would
of existence of a text and of the cultural eld where it belongs. enter the realm of sculpture. To the attributes painting lacks in
The question before us is, what would this critical and self-conscious the proposed scheme, I would like to add some contradictory (or
gesture reveal when applied to the eld of painting? In other positive) characteristics, that is to say, to consider in relation to
words, what would painting in the expanded eld look like? And painting artistic manifestations that are three-dimensional and have
what consequences could such a reading of painting have for the movement. In Greimas rectangle, the proposed series of terms can
understanding of the medium in a pluralist art-world? be related to one another by contrary (not-3D / not-movement)
In order to answer these questions about painting, Krauss and contradictory (3D/ not-3D) relationships, as well as by
recommends the use of the categories of uniqueness/reproducibility relationships of implication (not-movement / 3D). Combined with
as the opposite binary terms within the Greimas rectangle. If one the aforementioned qualities, the eld where painting is located
wants to sketch some very general characteristics of painting related may then look something like the following:
to its status as cultural currency and to its way of circulating in According to the graph we can comprehend (in both senses of the
the cultural economy of the art-world, the bipolar opposition Krauss term) within the expanded use of the category painting artistic
manifestations that are now-a-days considered to be either unrelated
4 to one another (body art and digital art) or downright opposite
For Jameson such a historical reading is equivalent to the Lacanian Real, that to painting, such as installation art.6 The proposed scheme may
is to say, to the horizon that subsumes the text and that is, as in Lacans
case, non representable.
6
5 As but one example of the complex relationship of the neutral term to the rest
Another term Krauss uses for this expanded eld is postmodernism of the eld, the critic Robert Storr, talking with the Russian installation artist
(Hertz 224). Ilya Kabakov, states that installation may save painting, rather than kill it (125).
116 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Complex term (video installation/performance) axes here proposed can be thought of as possible within this model
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Dimensionality
3 iqueness/reproducibility
Rauschenberg prints/
photography/ 2
Stella/ Serra
l art) 1
Body art
0 Movement
2. AFFINE SPACE.
no-movement not-3D
I want to incorporate Krauss concepts of uniqueness/reproducibility Euclidean geometry by the group of similarity transforms (rigid motions and
uniform scalings); affine geometry by the group of affine transforms (arbitrary
to a scheme based on three-dimensionality and movement. Thus,
nonsingular linear mappings plus translations); and projective geometry by
movement and 3D will be placed in a three-dimensional plot, projective collineations. There is a hierarchy to these groups: Projective > Affine
with axis x, y, and z standing for: movement (x), dimensionality (y), > Similarity > Euclidean. As we go down the hierarchy, the transformation
and uniqueness/reproducibility (z). The space created by the axis groups become smaller and less general, and the corresponding spatial structures
becomes, in turn, three-dimensional: become more rigid and have more invariants. Projective geometry allows us to
discuss coplanarity, and relative position using the cross ratio or its derivatives.
Being independent of one another, these variables can help locate
However in standard projective space there is no consistent notion of betweenness.
different points in the dened space as the sum of three coordinates: For instance, we can not uniquely dene the line segment linking two points A,
A= (x,y,z). In such a realm, any work of art related to the three B. The problem is that projective lines are topologically circular: they close on
themselves when they pass through innity (except that innity is not actually
7 distinguished in projective space all points of the line are equal). One solution
In his Erlanger Programme (1872), Felix Klein formulated geometry as the to this problem is to distinguish a set (in fact a hyperplane) of points at innity
study of a space of points together with a group of mappings (the geometric in projective space: this gives us affine space. What this means for our topic is
transformations that leave the structure of the space unchanged). Theorems are the possibility of transformations in the in betweenness realm between two, in
then just invariant properties under this group of transformations. Euclidean principle, distinct artistic manifestations. I am indebted to Dr. Eugenie Hunsicker
geometry is dened by the group of rigid displacements; similarity or extended for having introduced me to the mathematical models used in this article.
GUSTAVO FARES, Painting in the Expanded Field 117
Conceiving the expanded eld of painting as an affine space allows The expanded eld of painting, as presented in this essay through
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for the shifting of positions from point to point to point, which is the expedient of a Greimas rectangle that incorporates the notions
nothing short of the possibility of continuous transformations of the of unique-ness reproducibility, multidimensional affine spaces, and
elements of the group, in our case, art-works. The group-elements can history, performs a gesture similar to those of Jameson and Krauss
be identied as static whenever one wishes to stop them in order on their respective texts: it questions at the same time that it
to see their status at the moment of observation. Such a freeze of acknowledges the logical and historical conditions of existence of
the eld comes at the expense of momentarily putting aside its the medium and the texts or, in our case, the artworks. As I noted
continuous shifts and transformations. Body art, for instance, can be before, the resulting eld also relates painting to other artistic
seen as an isolated artistic manifestation, at the expense of severing manifestations previously seen as different or even opposite to this
it, albeit for a moment, from painting, movement, and 3-D, not to discipline. By making evident the conditions of existence of the
mention from other potentially enriching manifestations such as medium, the expanded eld allows the art-works to be embodied
dance or sacred rituals, manifestations that can be accommodated meanings, not just representations of meanings imposed from the
in the expanded eld here proposed. outside in a sort of a-historical fashion. Being historicized and logical,
the expanded eld is not, however, all-inclusive and non-critical. In
3. HISTORY. other words, it is not pluralist in as much as this term is identied
with an anything goes (as long as it sells) attitude, more related
Adding a historical element to the proposed eld and to its logical to the world of the spectacle and of fashion than to a kind of art
nature, as Jameson and Krauss did in their studies, I would like to that is intimate and powerfully thought.
venture that painting has been giving away throughout history This expanded field makes it possible to locate different artistic
some of the territory it carved for itself ve centuries ago, if not manifestations taking place today in society. In turn, the proposed
before, and that this expansion is witnessed by different forms and way of thinking about painting makes room for the reinvestment of
media prevalent today. Narrative, for instance, has been taken over the medium with the currency it has lost/lacked for some time now.
by the video, while the importance of seeing and of being there The expanded eld also affords the possibility of transformations and
seems to have been passed on to the realm of the installation and movements in one or more dimensions at the same time, shifting
performance art, where the actual space is an important component from one form of expression or given object to another, and even
of the piece. The message, if ever was such, has been emptied expects the possible addition of new visual dimensions. In this regard,
from the painted piece and taken over by the critics, or the to quote but one simple example, the advent of computer-generated
artists themselves, as a verbal activity, parallel and not necessarily art is just a shift away in the eld from painting, photography, and/
related to the art works being produced. This dilapidation of the or reproducibility. Moreover, the proposed eld is still open to new
meaning and means of painting over the last centuries need not and original artistic manifestations, alerting us to the existence of
necessarily herald the end of the discipline nor even its closure. new potential artistic dimensions and to new ways of recognizing
This dissemination may point instead to a second wave of freedom and navigating them.8 These new ways are not, however, opposite to
for painting (the rst one being the advent of photography and the painting but, together with painting, are part of an expanded eld
movies), as well as to a sharing of paintings former visual monopoly as it has developed historically. Thinking of painting in these ways
with other art-forms we nd in the context of an expanded eld, preempts the early dismissal of the discipline and/or its premature
where means of artistic expression considered to be in opposition death at the same time it calls forth and celebrates a pluralism
to painting or to one another need not necessarily remain in a that is critical and politically non-oppressive, as a type of Utopia
contentious situation. already taking place in our midst.
REFERENCES
8 Crary, Jonathan. Techniques of the Observer. On Vision and Modernity in the
New dimensions such as temporality or audio, for instance, could be added to
Nineteenth Century. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991.
movement, 3-D and uniqueness and, if fact, are being added all the time in
performance or installation pieces, where the elements of time and sound are Danto, Arthur. The Philosophical Disenfranchisement of Art. New York: Columbia
as important as the visual ones. UP, 1986.
118 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Foster, Hal. The Problem with Pluralism. IN John R. Lane and John Caldwell 1985
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Rosalind Krauss analyzed the expanded field in sculpture (Krauss,
1984). In this expanding, one of the aspects worth emphasizing is
the recurring presence of crossbred places that not only appear in
the circumscribed spaces of the screen, but in painting places, at
the same time, of figuration and abstraction, of volume and plain;
from inside to outside of the frame and inside to outside of the
POIETIC, MATTER AND FIELDS IN THE PAINTINGS OF KARIN painting itself. The figurative elements, symbolic and spacial, coexist
LAMBRECHT in multiple systems, generating tension.
Icleia Cattani Among the issues evoked by the current expansion of fields, there has
also been, since the modernity of the beginning of the XX century,
Translated by Ana Carolina Azevedo a literalization of elements that constitute painting, beginning with
cubist collage. In the 80s, for example, where should be a mirror,
ABSTRACT: This essay has as its conveyer the painting of Karin the image reflected upon it is unfolded in the background, as if the
Lambrecht, an artist of extensive trajectory. Her work has always dealt reflection had a life of its own, which actually occurs in many of Iber
with painting made with, besides oil paint, acrylic with dirt and other Camargo's paintings. In Karin's logic of painting this literalization
natural pigments. Her contemporary production is also characterized also exists since those years. She replaced the representation of a
by blood paintings. The focus of this essay will be the analysis of cross by cut canvases in this same form a tiny gecko egg, found
relations of her poietic and her works poietic between the used in her home garden, was incorporated into one of her paintings
materials and the deriving matter in paintings, the characteristics (Forma deitada, 1996), for example. Thus, when blood began to serve
of different propprops and how these questions altogether define as a supply for painting, it had nothing to do with a rupture but
works as their fields. Concepts of material imagination (Bachelard) with a radicalization of an already existent logic that expands the
and of specific fields, expanded and out-of-the-field of painting, matter used for painting to the matter of the world.
will be utilized. To these I add the concepts of metamorphosis and This literalization of elements corresponds in general to the historical
borders, to deal with the complex reality of works and questions issue concerning the replacement of the principle for the visible
that emerge from the painting itself. worlds representation, which has been occurring since modernity
by the introducing of the object-art: one more body in the world,
KEYWORDS: Contemporary painting, poietic, matter, material, fields a new reality.
of painting, Karin Lambrecht The passage of the representation principle to the introducing of
it occurred by means of ruptures, resuming and interruptions. It
Matter is the unconsciousness of form. was absolutely not about an evolution, which does not exist in art,
Gaston Bachelard but about changes that come together and constituted the modern
and contemporary visualities. On the subject of space, there was a
The works of Karin Lambrecht expand themselves to the borders substitution of a tridimensional space which tries to create the visible
of pictorial field, not just to an expanded field but to a certain once again, by multiple and tense places that create new conditions
point, an out-of-the-field of painting, nevertheless keeping a for the exchange of looks between the piece and the spectator.
profound correlation with it. It is a back an forth motion, not a In Karins works case, it is about the painting as a real element.
linear trajectory from a situation to another; a motion defined
by its poietics own logic1 and the works that result from it in 1
its own poietics. The expansion of the field of painting occurs in We have described in this essay, the processes of the artist inside the concept
of poietics, comprehending her previous or concomitant motivations to the
conduction of processes of work the last ones in themselves and the work's
installation in its finalization. According to Ren Passeron, the goal of poietics is
Research supported by CNPq as a Productive and Iniciao Cientfica research not so much the establishing one nor the established work, but the establishing
scholarship. conduct (1989, p. 130).
120 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
By the time that the object-painting does not represent anything MATTER/SUPPLY (OR MATERIAL)
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Every quote from the artist have been collected by the author of this essay, (visual and material can also be added to it). Each painting is a
from the years 1980 up to now. new moment, greatly defined by materials chosen or left by chance
ICLEIA CATTANI, Poietic, Matter and Fields in the paintings of Karin Lambrecht 121
and by her mental relation, emotional and physical, to them. The Ester or Ester Entra no Ptio Interior da Casa do Rei, 1987, evidences
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quick analysis of some artworks allows to assume how the usage the ruptures made by the artist, concerning the traditional universe
of such materials was modified in his paintings. of painting, for the inclusion of tridimensional elements inside
Anita Oaba, 1985, is a part of a series of paintings that approach pictorial poietic itself, constituting it with the traditional painted
the concept of bad painting: painted with synthetic polish, bad prop. Thus, since that moment, Karin already operated ruptures with
painted as according to the artist, it corresponded to a moment the plainness of paintings real prop, the canvas. This process marked
in which she strongly felt the desire to defying the limitations of her artworks since then, as much by the adding of tridimensional
painting and to shock by the created forms. According to Miguel Chaia, elements as for the displacement of the prop from the wall to the
from 1983 to approximately 1987, his paintings second phase after ground, as it occurs in some works from that time.
the return of Germany, the artist was concerned with the urban- In that same moment, the artist began to paint without chassis,
industrial dimension which provide residues of productive bankruptcy which hanged free in the space. Just like it can be assumed, the
and urban deterioration for his installations and constructions experiences beyond the painting's traditional specific field occurred
(2002, p. 33). From that comes the usage of industrial paints, as early in her career. And what would be this specific and traditional
in Anita Oaba, and a formal closeness to neoexpressionism, which field of painting? According to the painter and drawer Mrio Rhnelt,
marks as passionate both form and making. As many of the 80s he would obey two ineludible determining factors: a) the painting
paintings, this one possesses great dimensions, above those of the is a rectangle in which an image is inserted (whatever other
human body, demanding from the artist a body-to-body experience shapes are experimental detours), and b) the painting belongs to
with the canvas; this issue would come to mark Karins work in the wall (it is painting's place par excellence, perpendicular to the
its following. According to Marilice Corona, painting for Karin is eye; other places are also experimental detours). These determining
permanency and persistency, as a battle arena or field, for when factors added to many paints, pigment and prop variations,
painting assumes the bodys dimensions, there happens a clash. Its addition of materials unknown to tradition constitute the ideal
about a direct linkage with our existence and ephemerality.3 The model of this practice. (2011, p. 7-8)
artist, on the following of her work, mentioned and wrote in her By this definition we can see that, although, since the beginning of
canvases the expression in Arena, emphasizing the multiple clashes her career, Karin has acknowledged herself as a painter, her work
with figure, prop plans, the matter of painting and also with the quickly took over the path of experimental detours mentioned
new clashes made towards that which emerges from these first by Rhnelt. They partly constitute the expanded field of painting.
ones: the unconscious, the sacred, the whims and desires, among As time went by, the artist kept going beyond these, but always
which those of life and death. from a material imagination of painting. The usage of lamb blood
In Sem Ttulo, 1986, the artist, under provocation of a practice provoked changes in her poietic, leading her to the expansion and,
of which she is against (the remake of an art piece from MARGS, finally, outside the field.
from the project Projeto Releitura do Museu), chose a piece that Blood as matter/material of art and matter of the body and of life,
showed an ideal universe, like rosy babies and a loving mother, and is from the order of the shapeless (Didi-Huberman, 1995; Krauss e
created a contradiction within this theme: an obscure mother, barely Bois, 1996). It is the artwork that gives blood a shape and it is
perceptible against the background, with open arms, tragic-looking, the body that houses it as a continent. the flow of this matter/
stylized to the point of looking like a cross. In this painting, also in material, its quantity, are also a part of the shapeless factor as
wide dimensions, as most of the pieces produced at the time by the an excess, uncertainty, chance. Blood defines the piece, more than
artist, it becomes evident as well the addressing of neoexpressionism, its own creator, the artist, and defines it as a transgression, as
although a visible change occurs in the pigmentations used in this dirt, uncontrolled, opposed to the tradition of painting and partly
work, as compared to the previous ones. even to modernity, because if chance is not a part of art since
that last, the literalization of the elements component to painting
(layers, reflexes, transparency etc.) will only occur in contemporary
times. To materialize blood, show its density, quantity and smell, is
3
With blood over the robes that appear as prop in works from the areas such as anthropology, history, philosophy and literature.
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series Registros de Sangue (Blood Records), the human and animal Karins works go in some of these directions, generating
bodies get confused; the blood smeared and stained in them is unconsistencies. These could be thought from more than one
interpreted as being human blood, from that who wore that specific concept and practices interconnected, such as the border, the
robe. The information that is deals with animal blood is offered to frontier, migration, mutation, metamorphosis, substantives in her
the spectators in technical specifications of each work. Nevertheless, pieces. They are impermeable, mobile and affect the painting in
the force of invocation of the human body by the connotated prop its totality, which exists as a place and as a body. Karin also
stays, generating questioning: to which extent do we differ ourselves explores the memory of it, many times naming its parts as if
from animals and from nature, mainly in death? In these works of meaning could flow from it. Flow, blood, circulation, besides names
Karin, matter induces as many or more reflections than the shapeless of body parts such as kidneys, lungs and heart, are present in
factor of shapes (forms). her paintings since before her bloody works. The artist does not
wince before these bodies created or re-created in her paintings,
FIELDS before metamorphosing them into pictorial bodies that take on a
partial or total tridimensionality through elements aggregated to
The field, of the fields of painting, are another substantive question the canvas or to the fact of it taking on the form of a volume,
in the artists work. According to Victor Stoichita, every framed free in the ground. Many times, she substitutes traditional props
painting, even if non-representative or non-illusionist, is a negation by single fabrics and other materials; this procedure, systematic as
of the wall. (1993, p. 38). But does the painting that escapes it is, is no doubtfully the most meaningful for the forwarding of
from the wall, that invades the tridimensional space, ceases to be her work, of an expanded field to an outside-of-the-painting-field.
painting or only of being a framed one? To what extent the fields But the props and their positions in space are intimately linked to
of painting are limited in this last one? In modern times, according materials. As the works with blood, other meaningful ruptures with
to Mredieu, painting created any sorts of innovations inside the painting tradition began to occur in matter, in props and even in
prop, as the extraordinary invention of collages and works inscribed other modalities of presentation of artwork. The inside and outside
in the canvases' spaces, but did not break with it. (2004) Language body frontiers are re-taken, re-worked on, re-created. The artist
expanded itself in materials, but within traditional chassis limitations. emphasizes the exchange between the outside and the inside, giving
It is in contemporary times, if we consider that being since the 60s,4 the spectators a more real idea of what we are in our materiality
that painting begins to invade the tridimensional space, breaking and in our relation with the world fragile, porous membranes,
its barriers and expanding its field. with non-communicative frontiers, more illusory than real.
It could be said, from these considerations, that the framed paintings Karin uses lamb blood as a material for her pieces, differentiating
field and the field of painting are two complementary issues, although them from previous ones. The artist considers these works to be
distinct from each other. What constituted the specific field of a separated from painting by the kind of exigency they demand. If
painting piece is its intern field, not the limitations of forms of its painted works demand a solitary and reflective work, the ones with
prop (as a basis); the expanded field refers to that which expandes, blood demand an interaction with the peons that killed sheep and
but inside a pictorial thinking; paintings outside-of-the-field factor made them bleed in every farm that was visited, providing the
would be that which projects it beyond its own borders. matter for the paintings. Besides these, there are always people
In contemporary art, that occurs since a cross of questions of who accompany the artist as participant observers, being them the
painting with thinking, matters, forms and practices that come from farms owners and artists or friends that she invites. Karin does
other visual arts areas, since other traditional languages as drawing, not initially interferes in the process, unless for putting a canvas,
engraving, sculpture and even photography, cinema, performance, fabric or robe below the place where the blood will drop. Since the
installation and new technologies; and also from other knowledge moment it starts to ooze out, the artist begins her work.
Her first blood work, in 1997, entitled Morte eu sou teu (Death I
am yours), had as its props two family tablecloths, used in many
4
This is the same moment in which Rosalind Krauss admits and analyses the
occasions. These two are knotted together. Cupper wires and a
widening of the sculpture field (1984). long form made of clay a needle, according to the artist
ICLEIA CATTANI, Poietic, Matter and Fields in the paintings of Karin Lambrecht 123
complement it. In this first contact with matter, symbolic and south. Alvo can mean that body that was put down in the fights
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material questions are crossed, being the choice of the tablecloths for territory, or the animal that hunt to survive. These works also
the linked prop, empty of subjective meaning and the blood, a bring another connotation to them, which is that of reassigning a
body matter, symbol of life and death, health and disease, means meaning for the relationship between people and their food, and
a sacrifice. The blood incorporated itself in the tablecloths, a past consequently with earth and life, to go further than the abstraction
heirloom from woman to woman, remembering the passage of time, of aseptic packages on supermarket shelves. They try to make people
the affective bonds, the loss of those who died and the new births. acknowledge their own bodies and the link between these and death.
Karin was the keeper of these cloths, which would then be turned Alvo in portuguese can mean target, linguistically does that
over to her daughter. mean we can also be targets? The painter sets up a taut dialogue
The physicality differentiated in this material translated in many between these questions, her own body and her doubts about her
ways into this work and into the following ones; the artist evoked origins and her place in the world.
in an interview that the huge quantity of blood has surprised her. The piece Linha de Sangue deserves to be more scrutinized.
Thus, she had to interfere in the following day, withdrawing with A piece of cloth put over a lamb killed in the traditional Rio Grande
her hand the excess of blood that would not dry out; mixing it with do Sul way that is to say, by having its neck perforated and
water, the made the same three drawings on paper, smearing the its body hung upside down until all the blood, and life as well,
material directly with her hands and impressing them on the prop. is drained from it.
To print the marks of her own hands would be a dialectic instrument, The artist slowly raises the cloth, collecting the blood in a line,
as Didi-Huberman writes regarding handprints in pre-historic caves, which is to be understood as the time line and life line. She takes
by indicating a contact and an absence simultaneously (1997, p. care for this line to stay relatively in the center; also, she proceeds
31). Karin summarizes lucidly this analysis in declaring that her with caution, to make the line stop more of less at the same
handprints in these works are the proof that she had been there. distance it began that is, at 50cm from the cloths edging ,
Maybe the same could be said of the works matter, the lamb blood by accelerating or slowing down the raisings rhythm, concerning
that proves this animals presence in the moment of the works the blood-oozings strength: faster as it begins, slower in the end.
realization, and its absence (death) in the moment we contemplate When finished, the artwork looks like a line, with some sparks of
it. Just like the lamb, by means of its blood, the artists handprints blood, which goes darker with time; it is placed at the center of
will indicate her presence even after she disappears. two words in mid-emptiness, in the crude white cloth, and has a
The practice of drawing together with bloody paintings followed in length of 12 meters.
many of her works. In those, the artist would ask her accompanying Beyond this seemingly humble facade, many issues come up
people to print the animals organs in paper sheets and there they regarding the artists poietics and the artworks installation, the
should write the organs names. This has to do with a new way time-space relation and the importance of matter in the paintings
of evoking body parts, which she had already made in previous places constitution.
paintings by writing on them. The bloody pieces therefore widened The duffel cloth was left three months in open air, so its waterproof
her paintings field, but kept and expanded an intern and preexisting covering would be washed off with time. During the months, rain,
logic in her work. wind, plants came and went over it, leaving marks that ended up
In Alvo, 1999, the previous drawing, done by using wax, reveals looking like palimpsests. This procedure is now unusual in the
itself under the spilt blood, representing the place of action and artists work. However, it has been reassured a new meaning by
substituting the words in Arena. The place where the painting takes the presence of blood, which is a live, sensible matter, put over
place is the location of a fight, of the clash, and maybe of sacrifice. something already touched by nature, time and wait. To have the
The blood in this painting evokes not only the pulsing of life and canvas pulled during the blood spilling is also relate it to time.
death, but also Brazils violent history, specially of the state of Rio The work is established in the time being from the first to
Grande do Sul (she makes direct references to the decollation, a the last drop of blood, in the passage from living being to dead
knife wound from side to side of the neck, which are symbolically carcass. The piece is deemed done with the last drop of blood.
present and are evoked and exorcised in her works with blood); The artist collects and puts away the material, making from her
also, the history of Latin America is also evoked, specially to its gesture an act of painting.
124 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
The spectators look also needs some time to fulfill the trajectory of goes from right to left. Over this superior limitation of the form that
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this line over the 12 meters of canvas, a trajectory that, accordingly is different from the other sides are hanged four aprons, three of
to the paintings proximity, has to be accompanied by the bodys which are stained in blood. The last one remains untouched; two of
real displacement. them are hanged in the parts that exceed the rectangles limitations,
The place of matter is the plane, the duffel cloth that symbolically and the other two are inside of it. This whole set is in the middle
takes the role of a shroud, depository of the sacred substance of the space, far from the wall; on it, behind one of the clothes,
collected from death. This is an opaque place with no deepness it an enormous photograph in black and white is hanged, composed
develops itself in time and in a first plane, bringing to it human by two hands of which one can see black-dressed fists holding
being's deepest issues, of life and death, thus confirming Paul Valry's one of the viscera of the animal whose blood stains the artwork.
saying that skin is the deepest. Prints of the animals viscerae over paper wrap up the installation.
Karin deeply envelops the body itself in her poietic, which corresponds Karins work at this point shows painting consistently abandoning its
to what classifies painting as a pure process that is, in actuality, a specific field, its matter, support, wall, unity quality of being itself in
phenomenological relation towards the act of painting. In her work, the world, to bring it all for itself, including elements from outside
we can see a line of thought that concerns and works with matter, the field, such as photography, sculpture (of which the wooden floor
which brings us to declare that painting always is an abstract can serve as support) and drawing. Paintings receptacles themselves
experience, even when figurative, for it is the matter that serves are not conventional, such as clothing and crosses; these last ones
as its conductor. In the same way, in an unreligious appropriation are tridimensional objects that can be observed by all sides. What
of Christian figures, she uses them in her present work, more as is seen in the end is an installation, something out of the field
allusions than as forms. She perceives blood as the victims shadow, of painting. However, by the artists trajectorys own logic, the fact
be that the sacrificed lamb or the peon that makes it bleed in a that it is guided by a thinking that comes from and is about
ritualistic, laic, traditional and unchangeable manner which is, painting can be verified. It is an out-of-the-field in which painting
according to the artist, also empathetic and respectful. is presence, guidance and power.
The thought that guides her work also brought her to work concretely The clothing in this artwork began to make part of the support of
with the concept of frontiers. In a first project, she planned on other bloody works, adding up to the photographs, which often show
going to Argentina, Uruguai and Chile, collecting dirt from the many them being worn by people. Some of them would become elements
border regions and using them as matter for her paintings. Later of an installation, and other would follow up as the works Con
on, she followed the killing of lambs in many different manners, el alma en un hilo (2003) and Caixa de Primeiro Socorro (2005)
in farms of these same regions, for new works with blood as in which will appear next.
the works seen under. An analysis of the specific role of these clothing in this set of artworks
For Karin, the transgression of limitations happens in the interior of was done by Viviane Gil. She affirms that the artist invested, on the
this mentioned language, and at the same time it widens the new feminine figure, liturgical vests stained with blood as someone who
significations, such as when, in works of the year 2000, she began tells a tale yet hidden, but necessary to finish her talking as an
to insert works with blood in installations with other elements artist, defying the world to find out about the mythical characters
such as photographies. However, even these tridimensional works in the pieces own poietics (2007, p. 190).
have panting as their guide. Her work is ferocious, it deals with To this author, the clothing, which denominate parameters, are
the duality in respect/transgression to the limitations of pictorial anachronistic because they evoke multiplicity of times and have
language itself, which has always been her guidance. many connotations. They can be interpreted in many ways: as
This is seen in the Sem Ttulo (No title) installation, 2001: a space traditional woman clothing (aprons, camisoles), as liturgical clothing
is delimitated in the ground. This delimitation is made of a raw, (where the mentioned term comes from), as hospital garments worn
clear wooden raised platform, creating a small step up. Inside this usually by patients. All of these clothes are detached from fashion,
space, there are gaps forming crosses, in which are fitted crossed, subjectivities and historical time.
chassis-less, partially covered in blood canvases. Over this platform, Using the said clothing (by themselves or worn by someone, and
a structure is raised, made of wooden deadheads in a darker color, when worn, are in the artwork as photographs), the artist punctuates
forming a hollow rectangle whose superior limits horizontal length an out-of-the-field of painting that is conducted from within a
ICLEIA CATTANI, Poietic, Matter and Fields in the paintings of Karin Lambrecht 125
pictorial thinking, for these clothing are also painted, even if it four drawings with blood, shown vertically, the one above all being
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is with the blood of lambs or sheep. on a dark background just like the clothing, making it different from
Con el alma en un hilo, 2003, is formed by a photograph and four the rest. In the foreground a long piece of wood (a cot or scaffold)
drawings. The black and white photograph show a young woman is shown. In the three other sets, in the place of the photograph,
sitting sideways to the spectator, with arms hanging down at her are loosely hanged big pieces of fabric stained with blood, and
sides and head towards her own lap. She wears one of the light- beside them, the drawings. This is a unique/multiple work, on the
colored anachronistic clothes mentioned before; in the place her gaze wall but one which invades tridimensional space, mixing supports,
meets, a wide dark spot keeps spraying to every side. This stain languages, kinds of thinking: cross-bred work, out-and-inside the
is believed to be blood, based on the drawings that accompany it. field of painting, within its boundaries.
The young woman is sitting in foreground, in a landscape that Karins already mentioned declaration, that painting is a pure process,
stretches itself plainly almost up to the highest point of the picture. puts on evidence the importance of poietics. Her painting, effectively,
A light hill, in the background, identifies the place: the pampa. The is guided by her creative conducts, which go beyond body-to-body
skyline is extremely high, and only a small piece of sky is seen with itself. Her motivations and previous choices (materials, supports,
there. This is simultaneously a photograph and a painting, an almost ways to work, theme of artworks when they exist, for example, the
Renaissance-like picture. Not only the robes are anachronistic but great number of works using biblical characters) define process,
the image as a whole is inserted in western painting tradition. that body-to-body that occurs posteriorly. It is also fundamental,
Not only blood has connotation, but also the scenery, which is a not only in the created work, but in the painting in the making, in
limitation, a frontier. its installation. This evidences, as so little do, in brazilian art, the
According to Karin, this photograph was taken at Santa Maria clash between equilibrium and unmeasurement, between thickness
Anglica farm at Paipasso, showcasing multiple origins, catholic and and diaphaneity, between matter and material, between support
indigene (apud Gil, 2007, p. 185). It is situated on both frontiers, in and body of painting and finally, between the specific field of this
both cities belonging to the gaucho in Brasil and the Uruguayans and its expansion and insertion in an out-side-of-field, but inside
in Uruguay. Multiple limitations: the clothing and the body, the of a visual thinking and a material imagination of painting. Karin
body and the landscape, the geopolitical spaces between them, the faces and simultaneously respects the internal dialectics towards
photograph as an evoking of painting. contemporary painting, facing its own physicality. That is to say,
In the pictures right side, to which the body is turned, as if pointing forms, even when they are shapeless, engendered to the constitutive
to that side, are four drawings in that firsts same format, done tensions to the inside body of the work and the field in which is
with the same blood. Matter, the stains shapeless factor, connect to it inserted by its metaphors and frontiers/limitations that it carries
the clothing and oppose themselves to the definition of picture. It along with itself, porous and fragile membranes, but which define
is a multiple-sensed polyptych, in which everything evoked painting its place in the fields of painting and in the world of man.
although it is not there.
Caixa do primeiro socorro (First-aid kit) (2005) shows the same
young woman, on her feet and frontwards to a scenery much like
the previous one, but this time its a photo taken in another farm,
in Uruguay. Again, there is the thought of frontiers, materialized in
the artists poietics, in the place of action.
The young womans body also suffered metamorphosis on changing
places. The seemingly frailty of the previous picture is now gone,
giving place to an archetypal, imposing, monumental image, dressed
in dark robes (this is similar do a parameter). Her body is frontwards:
her head hangs loosely downwards and to one side, as if indicating
the bloody clothing again, but on the dark fabric, the stain is less
evident. This is a work composed of four pieces, separated between
them. What joins the picture, of big dimensions, brings to the side
126 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
REFERENCES
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walk around its rim.
The vase as an image is capable of evoking both the bearer of
life as a symbol for the womb and the container of death through
the figure of the urn, yet in itself it outlines merely an empty
space. Senises vase is formed by the mirrored image of a body,
whose presence through the figure-background segregation law of
DANIEL SENISE, 2892: BETWEEN BEING AND NOTHINGNESS, gestalt is duly effaced. The vase can only exist by obliterating this
THE SPECTATOR doubled body, by making it a spectre, that is, present but not seen.
Michael Asbury From these recurring themes, death, memory, the trace and the
shroud, it is reasonable to assume that the artist was experiencing
ABSTRACT: This essay investigates a work by the artist Daniel Senise between 1992 and 1993 a period of personal turmoil that overflowed
entitled 2892, which at first appears to be atypical within the into the work and that, in hindsight, would ultimately transform
oeuvre. It traces the production of compositional characteristics as his practice.
well as the repetition of themes and figures within other more Senise held an exhibition at Galeria Camargo Vilaa in 1993. In
overtly painterly works produced at the moment of conception of the accompanying essay entitled Sudrio e Esquecimento: uma
2892 arguing that there is a contextual coherence within the group tela de Daniel Senise nos diz que impossivel esquecer, Paulo
as a whole. Whilst almost two decades separate the conception of Herkenhoff invokes Duchamp in order to discuss the tensions at
2892 and its first public showing, the essay then speculates on play in Senises work.1 Suggesting that the background and figure
some interesting co-relations that exist between the site in which dichotomy is transposed into the duality between world and work,
it was shown and the trajectory that the other painterly work Herkenhoff concludes that:
concurrently took.
Na iconografia do Daniel Senise, um fragmento de um quadro,
KEYWORDS: Baroque, Duchamp, Neo-classicism, Readymade, Sartre, vestigio da historia da arte, um simbolo Readymade. Marcel
Self and Other, The Shroud. Duchamp considerava que tudo partia do readymade, desde a
pintura mais pessoal e, no entanto, extrada de um tubo de tinta
In 1992, Daniel Senise initiated a process of painting that would industrial, at, em ltima anlise, de um de ns, que samos dos
define his practice over the following decades. In the painting Retrato readymades que seriam nosso pai e me.2
da Me do Artista (1992) the outline of a seated figure can be
perceived out of the agglomeration of oxidised iron marks; a vague These issues effusing from Senise 1992-1993 use of readymade
shadow in the background softly emphasises the subject, making symbols, provide a way into discussing a work that he conceived
pictorial sense out of the apparent randomness of the traces of then but exhibited only this year (2011) namely 2892. The
nails. Another painting produced that same year bears the same eighteen years that have elapsed between concept and presentation
title. Only slightly smaller in dimension the painting depicts a seated were perhaps a consequence of what Senise describes as his baroque
figure who now appears in what seems to be an empty dark room character, his reluctance to leave things as they are, his desire to
shrouded by a sheet as if having just passed away. rework, to transform:
The following year, a similarly seated figure appears with its
mirrored double in Despacho. This time the figures are not
concealed by oxidation, nor by a shroud; instead, facing each other, 1
Herkenhoff, Paulo, in: Daniel Senise, Galeria Camargo Vilaa, So Paulo. Excerpt
they dominate the composition. Sem Titulo also of 1993, presents
reprinted in: Daniel Senise: Vai que ns levamos as peas que faltam, Pinacoteca
the same mirrored seated women, this time concealed by a shadow do Estado de So Paulo, 2011, p. 219.
that envelops everything except the space between them. From this
space the shape of a classical, archetypal, vase emerges. In 1994, 2
the same vase reappears, now inverted into the shadow itself, in Ibid.
128 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Acho que tenho uma resistncia para limitar meu trabalho a um stains, minute holes, areas that have been stitched, the faint traces
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tiro s, a uma afirmao to peremptria.3 of wear that betray the purity of their white surfaces. It is not so
much a case of leaving the canvas bare, but rather acknowledging
It is appropriate, then, that the first showing of this work took place the fact that these are surfaces that have been washed, repetitively,
in the main lobby of a neoclassical building. Designed by Grandjean again and again, after and against the impressions left by each
de Montigny, the former Casa do Comrcio that now houses the body. The shroud is not the most appropriate metaphor either; the
Casa Frana-Brasil, is a vestige of the early 19th century French sheets do not offer any visible sign of the human body, but only
Neoclassical taste, during the Brazilian Imperial period, and that signs of wear, traces that cannot be reduced to representations.
contrasts sharply with the excess of Colonial baroque.4 Yet, while we cannot so easily identify the presence of readymade
2892 appears to be an atypical work within Senises creative symbols, as Herkenhoff suggests with other works by Senise, within
trajectory. It is formed by two long white panels. Enigmatically the limits established by this work, the spectre of Duchamp remains.
entitled Branco 2430 and Branco 462, these panels were installed Octavio Paz described Duchamps Large Glass (The Bride Stripped
along Montignys neoclassical colonnade, facing each other and Bare by her Bachelors Even) and Given: 1 The Waterfall, 2. The
forming a long corridor - as if the artist wanted to separate the Illuminating Gas, (tant donns: 1 la chute deau / 2 le gaz
viewer from the architecture, from the world perhaps. Each of these dclairage.) as parentheses between which not so much the idea
canvases were formed by the amalgamation of segments that together of art as the modern idea of the work of art was contained.5 The
form a grid. Subtly distinct from one another, one side is formed placing of the spectator with regard to the work is also revealing:
of almost square segments while the other by narrower rectangles
approximately half the surface area of those on the opposing side. In the Large Glass, the spectator must imagine the scene of the
These differently-sized segments are in fact stretched double and Brides delight at being stripped; in Given he sees her in the
single bed sheets. Conceived in 1993, the project consisted of donating actual moment of fulfilment.6
white bed sheets to a motel and a cancer hospital. At the end of
their useful life, the sheets were recuperated, stretched, and placed Octavio Pazs consideration of Duchamps Large Glass and Given
facing each other; on one side, those used by the motel (2430), on as standing as limits (pre and post coital) does not consider the
the other those from the hospital (462), forming between them a ambivalence of the female nude in Given, which could either be
corridor through which the exhibition visitor walks. Unlike Bruce experiencing the moment of fulfilment or lying there, perhaps
Naumans Green Light Corridor (1970) however, Senises 2892 does even dead, after an episode of violation. Seen under such a light,
not oppress the spectator, there is no forceful containment or the machinations of desire and the sexual act become tragically
restriction, the space between simply exists as a thoroughfare. The consummated. Senises 2892 could be understood as associating
numbers which add up to 2892, the title of the work refer to sex with death, not as the result of violence, but as a homage, or
the estimated number of bodies that have passed through each group an act of mourning, for the loss of his friend the artist Leonilson,
of sheets. As the captions make explicit, their distinct dimensions are who died the same year this work was conceived. 2892 transcends
determined by their previous use, by the association of the double nevertheless such interpretative reductions because it invokes not
bed on one side with sex, and the single on the other, with death. the sexual act nor death but that which is between, the life cycle
The sheets are not quite readymades. They have undergone a process itself. It appeals in this way for philosophical inquiry into the human
directed by the artist even if his own hand, or labour, was not condition: an invocation that is already implied by its title, which
involved. We can identify certain marks in these surfaces: stubborn speaks of a multitude of bodies that, like the mirrored woman in
his other paintings, remain spectral, invisible. Far from nothingness,
3
Vaso Chins, entrevista com Agnaldo Farias, in: Daniel Senise 2000-2006, Museu
Oscar Niemeyer, Curitiba, 2006. Excerpt reprinted in: Daniel Senise: Vai que ns 5
levamos as peas que faltam, op. cit., p.249 Paz, Octavio, Marcel Duchamp, The Viking Press, New York, 1978, p. 87.
4 6
Daniel Senise, 2892, Casa Frana-Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, 2011. Ibid. p.106.
MICHAEL ASBURY, Daniel Senise, 2892: entre o ser e o nada, o espectador 129
these apparently blank walls of sheets stand for the parentheses the Others look I constitute myself as a look. (p.393) For Sartre
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between which one becomes conscious of ones own being. this confrontation of gazes can only lead to the submission of one
2892 also offers a means by which to reflect upon the creative and the domination of the other. Relations between Self and Other
trajectory of the artist himself by considering how the formal are in this sense either masochistic or sadistic.
transitions of his work open themselves towards the spectator, the Alex Potts writing on Winckelmanns 18th century History of Art of
individual, the self. Within Senises oeuvre, the image of the shroud Antiquity, comes to a similar conclusion to that of Sartre, only the
appears as a process-symbol or readymade symbol as Herkenhoff object of the gaze is not flesh but its representation:
defined it between Beijo do Elo Perdido (1991) and Quase Infinito
(1992); concurrent with this, is Senises use of doubling or mirroring Wincklemanns prefiguration of a modern consciousness of the
methods of composition. The figure of the vase, as mentioned above, deadly stillness of the neoclassical nude works because, in his
is one example, while in other works the gesture of doubling is more account, the blankness identified with the ideal figure, the
overtly imbued with sexuality. If we consider the Beijo and Quase stilling of emotion and desire in its perfected marble forms, is
Infinito as compositions that are themselves paired, interconnected coupled with an intense awareness of the kinds of erotic and at
themes emerge. The kiss as moebius strip, that infinite enveloping times sadomasochistic fantasy that could be woven around such
of outside and inside, is presented as the intersubjectivity of the self representations of the body beautiful.9
and other, body-less heads finding momentary unity in desire. When
seen in conjunction with the latter work, the kiss however becomes Senises sheets in other words, need to be blank, they cannot even
shrouded in the certainty of finitude, in the ultimate impossibility hint at the trace of representation contained in the shroud, since
of the fulfilment between the Self and the other. this would interfere with the consciousness of the spectator. The
By associating these two paintings the nonsensical concept of quase image of those bodies has to be denied otherwise a sexualised gaze
infinito becomes related to the approach of the Self and the Other emerges that disrupts the state of being-for-itself in the spectator.
through the sexual act. An ontological question thus arises where We have so far described a work that places the viewer between two
we find something comparable with Sartres notion of double blank walls. The viewer, now the subject of the work itself, stands
reciprocal incarnation: between the site of conception and that of death. Both of these
have taken place; they remain in a past that the viewer conceives
Thus the realisation of the Others flesh is made through my in the present. The structure is a device that has two functions: to
own flesh; in desire and in the caress which expresses desire, I cause a space of separation (between work and world) from that
incarnate myself in order to realise the incarnation of the other.7 which is beyond and to encourage in the viewer the awareness
of her or his own condition of being. The work achieves this by
Yet such reciprocal arrangement between oneself as flesh (being-in- rejecting any form of representation, because to do so would lead
itself) and ones own consciousness (being-for-itself) of the Other as only to the constitution of ones own sense of being as a gaze.
flesh, can never be complete, it vanishes as soon as it is consummated, The architectural relation that the installation creates is therefore
since pleasure is the death and failure of desire [] because it crucial. Heidegger writing on the Greek Temple in his renowned
is not only fulfilment but its limit and end.8 essay on The Origin of the Work of Art, claims that:
The totalising bond between self and other, infinite in its
consequences, is broken by the gaze: In the primordial reaction to It is the temple-work that first fits together and at the same
time gathers around itself the unity of those paths and relations
in which birth and death, disaster and blessing, victory and
7 disgrace, endurance and decline acquire the shape of destiny for
Sartre, Jean-Paul, Being and Nothingness: an essay on phenomenological ontology
human being.10
(Ltre et le nant: Essai dontologie phnomnologique, originally published in
1943), Citadel Press, 2001, p.391.
9
8 Potts, Alex, Flesh and the Ideal: Winkelmann and the origin of art history, Yale
Ibid. p.397. University Press, New Haven and London, 1994, p. 2.
130 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
If we think of Senises 2892 as equivalent to the vase that holds obscurecido formando uma imagem dual entre a verdade radiante
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the ambivalent condition of being the space of conception and do caminho do bem em oposio ao erro e a sua obscura
that of death, while also segregating that which surrounds it, then ambincia propicia para a autocontrio e expiao do erro.
we can conclude that the installation produced a form of veiling of []
Montignys neoclassical architecture that both obscures and frames Os dois espaos so simbolicamente interdependentes
it. It frames in so much as it summons such themes back into the demonstrando que o erro e acerto so as duas faces de uma
building, emphasising even if unconsciously, the relation with the caminhada humana unitria em que uma depende da outra. A
image of the corridor and Montignys architecture. salvao se ope perdio no caminho da iluminao final.12
Montigny, himself a product of the enlightenment, emerging in the
wake of Jacques-Louis David and the rise of neoclassicism, imbued his Judeo-Christian morality is implicit within the very notion of the
designs with the ideal of architecture as the embodiment of reason. Cartesian Cogito, since if we are aware of how things appear to
For the architectural historian Milton Vitis Feferman, Montignys us but not how they are in themselves, then such phenomena can
architecture can be framed within the context of the re-elaboration only be understood as a product of our own mental contents. In
of the symbols of life and death within the neoclassical symbolic order to avoid the solipsistic trap that this argument inevitably
language: opens, Descartes would himself rely on Divine intervention as a
form of reassurance that the world does in fact exist beyond
O Iluminismo radical francs, base filosfica da revoluo, the individuals consciousness. The very idea of reason therefore
obviamente um movimento anticristo, anti-religioso e de carter necessitated the transcendental self and the omnipresent divinity,
civil, que tinha como problema a substituio daquelas imagens the singularity and the totality.
religiosas por outras que no fossem apoiadas na tradicional Although speculation is rife on the meanings of Duchamps Given,
cultura greco-romana. within this context it could be helpful to understand it as a comment
[] on the fall (la chute) of the enlightenment (lclairage) through the
Mesmo depois dos movimentos anti-religiosos, durante a revoluo invocation of the body. The neoclassical simplicity and grandeur of
francesa, a imagem de uma caminhada rumo transcendncia the human form is disrobed by Duchamps juxtaposition of Reason
continua a ser feita sob a forma de smbolos, que mostram como with Voyeurism. The nude is taken off its plinth and left, discarded
o ser humano pode transcender rumo a uma vida futura, desde laying upon the landscape. It is as if the body by integrating nature
que suas aes simples e positivas do presente sejam feitas, por rather than standing above it (as in Heideggers Greek Temple),
exemplo, em prol do bem estar da sociedade.11 accompanies the libidinous act that transforms the apparatus of
single point perspective into a peep show.
Writing specifically on Montignys symbolic language, Feferman The unitary human path which is materialised through neoclassical
elaborates on the implicit morality of the architecture: architecture is similarly interrupted by the walls in 2892. If we are
to associate the Cartesian notion of Cogito, as analogous with the
A idia de opor um templo inferior e um templo superior, idia single point perspective (the self as gaze), then Sartres dismembering
geradora que Grandjean perseguiu em seu projeto, apia-se na of the being through the disjunction between consciousness and flesh
associao de um templo superior iluminado oposto a um inferior would require a form of doubling or mirroring device. In this way
the symbolism invoked in neoclassical architecture, which relies on
10
a unity of its paths becomes fragmented by that which determines
Heidegger, Martin, The Origin of the Work of Art, reprinted in: Martin Heidegger: the very limits of the path: the mirroring of the sites of conception
Basic Writings, Harper & Row, New York, Hagerstown, San Francisco, London, and death. The white walls that place the viewer between these
1977, p. 168. limits, disrobe the transcendental self that the architecture addresses,
11
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for it-self, as consciousness and flesh.
These speculations on the nature of an atypical work may in
fact offer a means of thinking about the disjunction of sites in
Senises more recent work, which since 2000 often have relied on
techniques of single point perspective. Not so much the baroque
inability of leaving the work as it is, readymade, we find here a
return to the process-symbol of the shroud where the imprint of
decaying architectural surfaces such as floorboards are captured and
reconstituted as perspective views of structures that could either be
in construction or in decomposition. The point of view from which
these perspectives are constructed is frequently positioned from the
ground. It is as if the observer is lying down, fallen to the floor.
Like the figure in Given, it is not clear whether the position is one
of demise or rest, or whether the spectator, placed on the floor,
displaced from her/his vantage point remains a voyeur or has become
the very subject of the work. That to which the shroud refers to.
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of the image linked to a verb, as a source open for experimentation.
The important thing was the potential of communications with
the public and the possibility of activating the circuits of political
relations, in a way to operate a maneuvre of social de-alienation.
In a second moment, already in the 70s, this experience begins to
incorporate new sources that reverberate directly in the periods
PAINTING AS A QUESTIONING production and in my work. Duchamp displaced this debate and
Carlos Zilio language to a more norm-defining field on putting the radical
aspect of the question of arts own nature. On the other side, if the
Translated by Ana Carolina Azevedo tradition of brazilian constructive art had already suffered a rupture,
the endurance of its lesson remained and this time, Minimal and
ABSTRACT: This article analyzes the making process of my painting. Post-Minimal will also relocate questions that renew the possibilities
Since the historical feeling of the crisis of modernity, painting has of phenomenological investigation.
always meant to me a manner of comprehending the amplitude Moments of this trajectory can also be detected in my work since this
and meaning of the said crisis. period. A lunchbox that, when opened, reveals a face overwritten with
the word LUTE [Fight] on its mouth (1967); a so-called businessman
KEYWORDS: painting, crisis of modernity, contemporary art. suitcase that, when opened, reveals many metal nails (1973); or
wooden structures over which rock blocks are balanced in tension
In the second half of the 60s, the crisis of modernity in Brazil, (1976). These are three examples of the process Ive mentioned.2
already predicted by the end of the Brazilian Constructive Project The experience one can obtain with my production between 1966
in its Concrete Arts and Neo-Concrete Art versions, gained its and 1976 is that of the delusion of modernity. From this point
definitive expression in the movement known as the New Brazilian on, to me, it was a matter of understanding the broadness and
Figuration. The premises of this production could be summarized into meaning of this crisis, of analyzing its premises and canons, in a
some general principles: execution impersonality, which implicated way I could extract from this discussion a pertinent historic relation.
the possibility of reproducibility of the work and the questioning To do such, Ive chosen painting, which was in the core of the
of its authority; the interaction between work and spectator; the crisis of art on account of having been modern and classic arts
non-hierarchy between high and low cultures, and the connection paragone. Not by chance, all of Greenbergs formalism concept has
between arts and politics. My work of art rises inside this context, painting as its core. Above all, choosing painting was a demonstration
marked by these questionings that therefore were already found that I understand its potential as a theoretical field capable of
outside the logics of an ontology based in form.1 proportionate a critical and productive point of view, because of
The discussion that my work lived through in this period is that of the said discussion.
placing itself in a culture that was entering even peripherally This period of new challenges necessarily has to be thought from the
the scope of consumer society. Distancing myself from the interest referential point of view of my living in Paris from 1976 to 1980.
In this respect, Paulo Venancio Filho makes an interesting comment:
* Would the fact of vanguardist artists and political commitments
Authors note. This essay is partly made up from points made on many other
being the starting line to Paris mystical pictorial traditions discreet
critic texts on my works. It is based upon a talking I gave to the Ciclo de
Palestras organized by Prof. Iclia Cattan and whose theme was A Pintura em presence (probably the last one since Eduardo Sued) be an irony of
Seu Campo Especfico (Painting inside its Specific Field) at Fundao Iber art? To find pleasure in an overdue artistic wager, in a unimpeded
Camargo in 2010. It is a part of my CNPq research. terrain of modern claims which must account for itself only, is
to be considered compensation, payback or political delusion? To
1
I have been present at some of the most important exhibitions from that
period, such as Opinio 66 and Nova Objetividade Brasileira in 1967, both at 2
MAM, Rio de Janeiro. To read my works mentioned of abridged in this essay, visit www.carloszilio.com.
134 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
go back being an artist with no ideological pressure but instead reconstruction with its historical pertinency. Barnett Newman, on the
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replace it with another, absolutely private one, is indeed the same other hand, proposes a conceptual complexity and the possibility to
existential commitment.4 overcome formalism as a conception of the history of art raised on
Contrariwise to artists from previous times, on arriving at Paris, the concept of sublime, next to Meyer Schapiro's concept of signifying
I knew, as my generation knew, that the city was no longer this form. These are possibilities to make the debate of painting fit an
worlds center of art and that New York notoriously had occupied ambit of reflection, away from the demand dictated by correction
its place. However, Paris proportionated me a location far away from devices to the likes of the art system.
pressure, and so I could obtain the critical displacement needed for To paint caused to localize, in the scope of pictorial production,
the reflections I had to do about my artistic and political doings productive issues capable of revealing a thought on painting itself.
thus, a double critic imposes itself, and immediately relocates These objectives were defined by cultural and theoretical approaches,
to the center the artistic and political vanguardist view, ones that always referenced in pictorial pieces. Between approximately the years
had been, up to this point, inseparable elements of the art and of 1980 and 1985, for example, I put myself to think about what
political relation. It becomes an evidence that both views (political is called brazility, that is to say, a certain view of the brazilian
and artistic) took themselves as natural consequences of a teleological art that is present since the year of 1920 and that kept going
historic process that consecrated them both as historic truth. strongly until the beginning of the 60s.
To remake a relation with History, and particularly with the History In a way, that would translate into my practice of putting myself
of Art, was a potentiality that existed because I was living in a city in front of certain works by Tarsila do Amaral and the entire
that made possible visitations to places from the Louvre to the oeuvre by Alfredo Volpi, besides the evocation of a geometrical
Pompidou-Beaubourg Center, which was inaugurated at the time, feelings given by Rio de Janeiros scenery in the relations between
with a great retrospective by Duchamp. Besides the immersion in mountain, sky and sea. In the same period, Greenbergs essay
parisian museums, French culture itself would have had an important on abstract post-expressionism makes me think of a series of
repercussion in my formation, overall by means of the Annales School questionings that objectively result in seeking for a relation towards
and the New History in its long duration sense, from Foucaults view the cromatic and spacial sense of Monet/Volpis, Matisse/Manet and
of archeology and Hubert Damischs conception of art history as posteriorly Rousseaus works. Brazility and abstraction, forwarder
a transitory process, that is, that History of Art is diachronic and to a limitation border, end up in an excess that wanted to explore
synchronic, linear and simultaneous. Rousseau and exoticism.
If painting is to me par excellence as a support that transits On this forwarding, Wilson Coutinho wrote: It is a dialectic of
between past and present, to retake it means to understand that return with the conscious sense of present. In this system, Zilios
it had new a negative meaning, a radical discontinuity towards the work does not seek to turn back, but to clash with a complicated
world, as if estranged from it. That understanding of the crisis, of net of plastic questionings. Never, in Zilios painting, will an
epistemological discontinuity between the support and the realistic encyclopedia of straight quotes come up, but it shelters procedures
that guided my relationship with painting. and problematic questions nonetheless. How to make plain painting
Painting was put by history in a bad place, and to maintain its become committed painting, a painting of extraction of layers
critical potential it should therefore put itself radically in the center or combination of procedures to both altitudes? At the same time,
of the crisis. To paint became, to me, to paint the painting. how to keep a pattern of recognition astuteness that does not
Seen from a more productive angle, the work of some artists began wish the forgetting of Barnett Newmans existence of sublime
to have a referential value in my work process. The establishment integrity. How not to forget it in a painting that does not wish
of a transitory relation that approaches Czanne and Jasper John's sublime anymore? How to push it away, keeping it and afterwards
ideas as the relation between modern and the modernity crisis. how to come up to Rousseau, not forgetting to recognize Matisse,
Czanne's doubt is taken not as a method in the relation between or Newman himself? The fascination is to organize a problem
sensation and real, but as an argument in the discussion of painting's around a procedure that Ive come to call austere, that does not
3 4
Paulo Venancio Filho in Carlos Zilio, Cosac Naify, 2006. Wilson Coutinho in Carlos Zilio, Cosac Naify, 2006.
CARLOS ZILIO, Painting as a questioning 135
recognize common iconography so as to make it excessively strange.4 this moment the historical references to artworks have worked as
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To finish an investigation is like finishing a game match. From that key points to paint paintings, now it tends to mainly wrap itself
point on, another match is taken, that is to say, one that deals with close, taking its own trajectory as its own basis, although always
the re-definition of new pictorial issues to be its goal.5 The next being subjected to new stimulus from the History of Art. With special
match would begin by the year 1987 and its spark was to take the highlighting, the relation towards my paintings from 1985 to 1987
blank canvas as the erased board of the previous iconographic excess are seen once again. These are artworks of grief. Not by chance
and the field of the plain exercise of subjectivity. Again, elements they also showed a subjective dialogue with the abyssal and obscure
(sandpaper, nails, saws) that previously composed my repertoire in colors from Rothko of the series Seagram building. Considering,
the so-called political times reappear, and now they trace lines and altogether, these mediations, the grief comes more as a reflection
planes and open themselves to a more existential issue. on the exercise of grief in painting than as its own existence.
A third movement, another starting line, can be seen between 1992 This already lengthy trajectory of permanent debate over a strategy
and 2004. It was the taking of an abstract model as the basic pattern for developing complex questions, seen in painting and systematically
of occupation of the canvas, and from that point on, practicing to faced, gives the whole work a unity quality characterized by
the extreme all possibilities this pattern and neutral color that I fragmentation. The result is a permanent issue on the theoretical
used would give me as modern repertoires investigation possibilities. density that paintings support brings from its long cultural and
If painting is said to have been killed by the crisis of modernity, historical existence. This ploys sense, as Ive procured to develop
the main issue becomes to consider once again the possibility of in this essay, is to investigate new possibilities of configuration
its re-definition. Some dialogues are inevitable: Robert Ryman and of painting, to keep its cignitive value and to create a singular
his analysis of the pictorial process; Newman and spaciality as an pictorial thinking.
investigation method. When this layer of references has been used
to its whole extent, both process and spaciality take us, inevitably, Carlos Zilio, 2011
to once again go over this issue in the foundations of Picassos
modernity. In the same line of thought, Giacometti and Morandi
become a part of it by a different temporality than that vertiginous,
generally identified as being the modern one.
As a sequence and unfolding from the year of 2000, orthogonality,
dialectically, gives space to a circularity that occupies the canvas.
The circular gestures continuity on the canvas surface emphasizes
the presence of the body that paints and the body of the spectator.
This body evoking reminds us of Rodin but, in this case, the drawers
one more than the sculptors one. The lines sinuousity and its
rhythm allude to Matisse as well.
The quotes made in this essay, from excerpts of many artists pieces
to references to my work, do not refer to a logic of influences
connected to objective procedures. What is at stake here is their
inducing factor, very helpful to formulate my successive approaches
of paintings investigation.
Another detachment, a new starting line, occurs around the year of
2004 and has a duration generally accepted as nowadays. If up to
The concept of game and starting line here used were made up by Hubert CARLOS ZILIO: Artist and researcher linked to the PPGAV/UFRJ
Damisch. Read on this matter the explanation by Yve-Alain Bois in Painting as (Programa de Ps-Graduao em Artes Visuais, Universidade Federal
Model, MIT Press, 1990. do Rio de Janeiro).
PAULO PASTA, Inside and Out of Painting 137
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form because I think that the forms I choose to paint look very
much alike the real schemes. And it is in this slow updating and
maturation of such systems or sign that sense is made.
I like to think that a given painting would be ready when added
to it all my stages, when condensed all my sensations. Only then
I can recognize myself in it, only then it would gain a kind of
INSIDE AND OUT OF PAINTING ideality and suspension. For that motive as well it is perhaps a
Paulo Pasta little slow: in a sense, it is day after day and paint over paint.
And, if my themes and my subjects are of long duration, repeating
Translated by Ana Carolina Azevedo and unfolding themselves, it would precisely be because only thus
it would effectively become mine and deeply recognized by me.
ABSTRACT: In this essay, the painter Paulo Pasta seeks to tell a But, as I was saying, it all started pretty soon. To see paintings is
story from within his own work; that is, from the forms he used as to me equivalent to the please of painting. And it was looking to
motivation of his painting, the author points to the main questions paintings, the reproductions of the works of masters of universal
that made his experience. A relation mediated by the making, in painting, that strengthened my taste. The pictorial surface was always
which he seeks precisely to build a reflexive distance between the the element that seemed to join my sensation to the world. This
project and the real experience of painting. feature plus color were the elements that gave foundation to my
taste and confidence to go on with my choice.
KEYWORDS: painting, experience, color, form. In the beginning, I used themes common to painting of gender.
Sceneries and still nature, in this specific order. I indiscriminately liked
Sometimes I see it and then paint it. Sometimes I paint it and Czanne, Van Gogh and Monet. But I think it was from Czannes
then see it. Both are impure situations, and I prefer neither. lesson that the comprehesion came to me of what would come to
Jasper Johns be the differences between seeing and painting: the discovery of a
true pictorial construction.
To me, painting was as far as I can remember a self-discovery. I Also moved by its example, and not only willing to portray a local
have no other connection of intimacy to any other language as landscape, that I moved on to a series of drawings themed with
I have with painting. To find it was to find vocation. That made sugar cane plantation. In this moment, I was thinking that I would
even more clear in the crucial moment of professional choices: Ive have to build a solid basis in drawing only to then experiment
always said I can have been through many crisis, but not through with paints. (By that time I would suffer, without any knowledge
that one. I understand today the level of ideality existing in my of it, a common contingency to a great part of modern brazilian
condition, and I think that such ideality is an important aspect to painters which has its origins in the program and teachings of
understand my work. Paris school of fine arts, where many of our artists studied and
Ive promised myself to follow this path as pathway towards fitting graduated). But these were colored drawings. They did not make
in the world. This way, painting has always been a very inherent use of just line or outline. They already pointed to the needs of a
activity in my own life. Today, I see that it seems to want to construction mediated by colors and pictorial values.
convey, in an equally very close, dosed and abstract manner, my In this period, I had already put my eyes on Matisses paintings and
own story. With that, I mean as well that my work has never had I thought I just had to do something like that. I can also say that
a projective meaning. It can be born within an idea, a wish, but this painter has always been present as a role model during the
what I seek for is precisely to avoid that this wish comes too whole process of me as a painter, with a little bit of variation of
soon in the project; maybe painting, to me, is the building of this the aspects of his influence, according to the time period. I could
distance between desire and project. Seems to me that painting also affirm that, if I think my possibilities of expression by color to
had to tell by itself the slow transformation of lived contents, in an be supported in his example, it was also though this example that
indirect and condensed way. That would be its manner of imitating, I could attest my difficulties in using them alive or contrasting.
138 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
I use to think that the admired Matisses painting would be, for connected myself to the past, gave me the possibility of structuring
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me, an ideal or something like it, and that it would be in the the painting as a plastic, autonomous field.
difference and distance that I establish towards it that it would be The way which these pictures were painted also evoked the said
better revealed who I am. past: they came up while I removed the last or next to last layer
When I began using paints, the natural choice would have to be of paint, in the colors of the previous layers. Looking back to that
oil, be it because of its history and tradition or its expressive time a couple of years, it occurred to me to think that they thus
power; but the technique I chose to do a series of paintings after realized a kind of drama of painting, of a serious space of painting,
the referred drawings was gouache. I was looking for a matted, and that it was born from the desire of a young artist looking to
water-born paint that didnt have the occasional artificial aspect of get closer to this language so engraved in history already.
acrylic paint. (A water-born paint would also make the passage of After that (and that was already in the beginning of the 90s), as a
drawing to painting seem more natural.) manner of painting in a way to reveal less traces of painting itself,
During a whole year I did paintings with gouache over paper. These to make it more affirmative and less referential, I began to make
works already brought with them the marks of yet another great the series I call shards. I began by reproducing the image of a
influence: italian metaphysical painting. The aspect of stopped time, floor made up of ceramic shards, which was in fact my ateliers floor,
of suspension, in these paintings, has always seemed too close to my and organized them into a random pattern. Next, I organized these
own sensations, and the color palette as well. many of them looked shards as autonomous elements, which proportionated new formal
dehydrated and coming from an emptied world, alike Morandis arrangements. From that point on, I began to use paint, instead of
colors. Morandi is the painter that gave me the key to escape from withdrawing it, and I think that this way helped me to achieve that
metaphysics. The world in his paintings (the carnal, physical world) what I still desire to acquire more of: the presence, the present.
seemed to have gotten away so as to make last one thing from The tonal passages were built by the successive adding of paint layers,
that which is durable in the world. Thus, he kept himself, in a way, but it was hard to break with the general tonalism, once I wanted
always a metaphysical painter, but substituted the title, the rhetoric to do it using a second and a third color (I had never thought
of movement, by the adoption of a repertoire much more connected my painting of that time as monochromatic; this characteristic was
to the daily life. (If, at one side, I owe a lot to Matisse, on the acquired unintentionally, rather one of the many eventualities that
other side I owe a lot to Morandi too. maybe this homage between happened to me during my career.)
both of them can be explained in my formations idiosyncrasies, After five years working towards that goal and seeking for bigger
and there I could also include Volpis paintings without damaging and less fragmented spacial unity, I began to paint what seemed
a possible notion of coherence.) to be the space between arches, which were used in previous works
These works on gouache were unequivocally figurative. Mannequins, (where I worked with many architectural forms), making this research
instruments such as hammers and scissors, tables, chairs, hats and result in images similar to columns.
plaster molds were frequent motives. After a year of work in this There were still denials, hidden areas of previous paintings, but
direction, I went back to using oil paint, now with the add-on of when they had a more defined and structured space by these forms,
bee wax (a means also called wax varnish), which opened up new colors could then vary. With this aspect, I think Ive gone forth in
expressive possibilities in my work. This gave oil a darker light my search of that which I call the present, of accepting contrasts
and straightened the passages between colors, and, if I may say, present in reality. The manner that I painted these columns also
created a distinct temporality for slowing light down and making suffered variation. If previously, in the shards series, I had used a
it less luminous. smaller brush and went on with it building the pictorial net tiny
I gradually abandoned the metaphysical concept of objects as well, streak by tiny streaks, in this new stage I could also, because of
and began searching for a repertoire of more simplified forms. The wider forms, magnify the brushs size and accomplish more plain
successive oil and varnish layers began to erase images, turning them and uniform colored areas.
into image vestiges. These corresponded as well to a more resolute From these columns, I obtained a larger number of variations.
disposition of the canvases surface, which became gradually more New articulations appeared: from the space between them, the shape
plane and topographical. These pictures were architectural forms, of some kind of sharpened pencil came up; withdrawing the third
essentially. Arches, pediments, ogives that, at the same time they columns, I had an empty space to be lightened up by color; two
PAULO PASTA, Inside and Out of Painting 139
forms which looked like bottles (in fact, the pencil itself, but with It would not be an exaggeration to think of the forms I use now
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a longer and round tip), in symmetry, made appear between them in my work to be transformations, a species of slow transformation
yet another column, etc. of forms that first occupy and build my doing, and that were
Simultaneous to this research, I began a series of works inspired by described here. In this sense I can also say that they posses origin,
the shape of a toy spintop. Just like with the shards, what came up or to say it better, that I can figure out where they come from.
in the beginning of this new series was the emphasis on shapes, on I also think that this isolated fact wouldnt be enough to explain
the theme. I valued the spintops, forgetting a little bit of that which them, such as I know this will of coherence and organicity may
is most interesting to me: the activation of space where things are, most of times come against a more airy condition of painting.
a space made up of fullness and emptiness, always mingled together. But I have had more estimation for this aspect of my work. It
By making the spinning tops and the space to come together, that seems to me that today, I am more distant from my origins,
is, at the same time, is when I began to expand them to the canvas and thus my work seems also to ask less of these strengths that
limitations, thus creating for the first time big shapes that did not were essential to it before. The new and not the novelty
fit into the canvas. With that, I found out other shapes between would be the question of my whole work, and of all new
the drawn spintops: hour glasses, upside down goblets, and so on, painting, and this question I believe acquires here a problematic
which became the new themes. nature, precisely for this work also seems to desire structuring
The more elements I have to paint, the more possibilities to my surprise, or prevent it.
work I accomplish. That contradicts a little bit what most observers I also think that passages, be them from a colors to another, or
describe as being the first thing to notice in my paintings, which a theme to another, as much as a condition to another, would
is color. In fact, I think it is due to this widening of forms that be one of the most important vector to comprehend what I do.
color gained more space and strength. Passages would cause, invariably, changes and transformations. Now,
I also think sometimes that this strength or saturation of some how to transform and at the same time identify myself with what
colors that I use would come to compensate the forms that become I do? Maybe that is where my attachment to series, similar forms
difficult to be seen, precisely because they are immersed in this unfoldings and the desire for each work to bear witness of that
chromatic density. These form-colors become strong, but also veiled. which has been lived comes from.
Maybe that is the origin of the tough conquer of a certain calm, Looking to my current painting, I notice that it was progressively
beating, hidden energy that they possess. abandoning a kind of interiority, of essence, to become more
When I think about light, I also think of the form (just like colors fluid and agile. I do not possess much identification with artistic
only exists because of each other). I do not disassociate them in languages or paintings that make reiterations of the superficiality
the elaboration of my work. Ive always liked colors that bear light, of the world a critic to this same state of world. In this sense,
and in this aspect I recognize a point of union between previous although I know how to evaluate its importance, Ive always had
and current paintings. My colors are composed, they come from a a difficult time with Pop Art. I would rather see works in which
derivative palette, that is, theyre colors made up from the physical this place is pointed by its absence, not by its ostensive presence.
palette, of physical colors. I like them when they abandon their When I accomplish creating this space in my paintings this
industrial characteristics, when they begin to go through the process kind of emptiness I recognize in them the same contents as
of experience, when they may become other colors, when they modify my beginning pieces, those of more influence in the metaphysical
themselves through the neighborhood, when they are added to each movement, only this time this condition would be given more to
other and suffer mutation. I used to use that metaphor of the the formal construction than by figuration.
fruit to characterize them. I am satisfied to believe that pictures My works gained these features I call fluidity and agility by the
mature in front of me. A fruit also accomplishes the highest stage year of 2004. I can identify many factors that collaborated to this. I
of saturation of color and taste when its ripe, but in the next remember seen with a lot of interest Sean Scullys room at the Sao
day it may become rotten. Colors become rotten as well. I would Paulo Bienal in 2002. They were big paintings, of a plain composition,
like my colors to have something analog to that, that they would to which the big task of constructing light was assigned to color.
be at the same time intense and abandoning, a perfect wed of Light emerged by means of counterpositions as well as superpositions
beauty and extinction. between themselves, thus the painter reached a surface unequivocally
140 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
pictorical and a harmonization through luminous atmosphere, which about the usage of color: if latency of forms made it come up as
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reminded me a lot of Matisse. I remember also the canvases inside wrapped in languidness, now they are ready quicker.
the screen, that is to say, small canvases inserted inside bigger ones, The mentioned two crosses were unfolded into three crosses. Today,
as if they were breaking this referred harmony, and at the same this space I created from three elements was simplified: i took some
time they seemed to repose the question about the theme of the parts of these pictures and this emptiness is filled by color. In this
work itself: painting within painting. game between picture and background, as Ive sought to describe,
In 2004, I became aware of the south-african writers work J.M. colors is the filling, creating thus an ambiguous place for painting.
Coetzee. I read many of his romances with much interest and was By the way, it was thinking about this constant game that I began
also impressed with the manner with which the writer accomplished a series of paintings entitled funmbulos. The name, of course,
transforming literature in his own theme. Many time, its narrator, was suggested by that which brings ambiguity, on addressing the
in third person, was also a writer or literary critic, thus duplicating unstable equilibrium between one shape and another: funmbulo
the narrative, making it stronger and ambiguous. I would avoid is the man that walks on the tightrope. A certain funambulism
the term metalanguage, in both cases the painter and the between one thing and another would be precisely the zone of
writer because I believe that both seek to insert themselves in indecision between these things, or between forms and colors. The
a different place than that one. To me, it is like they were working forms I use look like the bottles in previous paintings, between
on the eternal and recurring theme of question by the sense of the one standing up and the one on the ground, they make appear
making, thus transforming their own work into fiction. (The works between them another form, at the same time background and
emptiness, to me, was always the question of what should I paint). image, in a constant permutation.
Also in 2004, I presented a series of paintings in which I applied I understand I cant affirm many things regarding my work. To
many forms similar to the one I denominated beams. In fact, this affirm in the sense of seeking having with it a distanced relation,
name occurred to me because these forms suggested building beams, inserting an analysis that would put me invariably outside of it.
where a vertical beam made a horizontal beam suspended. Inside I could seek for a poetic solution, a poetic writing. But I seldom
these bigger beams the vertical and the horizontal making an believe this form would make me come up to a fair self-observation.
orthogonal arrangement , a smaller one would be inserted, as if I seek to reconstruct a little bit of its internal history, narrated by
they reproduced themselves, or as if one could contain the other, means of its forms. Its sense, wider and more complete, of course,
suggesting thus that the theme was born within itself, or mirrored is not of my knowledge, and I believe it must remain thus. In
itself. Like I said, that was suggested to me by the two examples this key, I believe also that my painting will always be forwarding
from artists mentioned above. (regarding my position). What I can see of its meaning are only
Proceeding thus, I could also vary thickness, places and proportions those particularities that induce me to make the possible, possible.
regarding these beams. How they organized better the space, leaving I wouldnt know for example to say what Ive already said about
it more dynamic, and also my colors, I think, were better organized my choice of colors. I can point with much precision the chromatic
by them as they became more rapid and contrasting. When the palette of some painters with which I possess deep affinity: for
beam came down, that is, when the horizontal one was lowered, the example, Bonnard, Diebenkorn, Brice Mardem. But the palette of these
shape that was formed was that of a cross. By the same impulse, painters is not dissociated of what they paint. The chosen themes
I doubled it. I made it two. Two crosses was my theme and my or the formal solutions found by them do not dissociate from an
motive for five years, and I still work with this shapes unfoldings expression by these specific colors. There is always, to me, a bigger
up to now. I got from them a bigger activation of space, making it affinity between that which they paint and the way they do it.
planer and defined. I abandoned as well the construction supported In a Bonnards green and mauve self-portrait, these colors would
in hand and pencil: if before I constructed forms freely, today I have also be this portrait. They are its form, once they cooperate in a
the aid of sticking tape to obtain better precision. This aspect also fundamental way in its sense. The same could be said of a scenery
collaborated to give these works a bigger mobility, even if subtle. called Ocean Park, by Diebenkorn. The landscape portrayed there
The screens shape also got bigger, and by means of this procedure are also colors. Colors build this space and are constructed by it.
I think I accomplished re-powering that kind of modesty towards I believe that it has been made clear to me, that which painting has
the presence that has always marked my works. I think the same to do with how to paint. And I believe even more in the strength and
PAULO PASTA, Inside and Out of Painting 141
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and transformed by previous motives, in a species of self-feeding.
A new motive would have to be filtered, decanted by work, until it
has been absorbed by this kind of system that I seek to build. But
here, the question would also be fitting: which system? I would not
know how to answer that, maybe because it exceeds myself as a
producer, but it would obey the same needs to identify painting, my
painting, its time, with the time that was lived. Up to that point, I
think, more impulsive actions, arbitrary choices and voluntary ones
would not have way. Like Ive already said, I need to recognize
myself in the paintings, in what is possesses in the result of added
states, to understand it as ready. I walk in the measure the work
also walks, and I recognize it in the measure Im recognized by it.
Temporality and duration would thus be the dimensions where
operations in which my work seems to be based on occur, and on
this path I put myself, distant also from separations between form
and content, and from its equivalent time-space relation. Sometimes
it occurs to me to think that my biggest issue would be in a
kind of unsolvable question, which is that of being inside and out
of painting at the same time. How is it to be inside when you
are outside? Maybe it comes from this endless permute, between
positions that would like to coincide, this infinite desire to posses
what possesses you, as in Manuel Bandeiras famous quote. I seek
to extract the sense and strength that update my work.
December 2010
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many cultural systems, just like there isnt between different
linguistic systems. As a consequence, we may never be able to
reach perfect transparency in the results of translation, leaving in
the end a somewhat opaque and thus untranslatable remanining
between cultural formations or confronting languages. (ANJOS,
2005, p. 20)
RAREFACTION: IMAGETIC PARADOXES
(CROSS-BREEDING IN THE PICTORIAL POETICS OF A RAREFIED With effect, the imagetic translations operated by research involve
VIDEOGRAPHIC IMAGE) procedures that make semantic adulterations in the image. These
Ricardo Perufo Mello adulterations are evidenced by the increasing perceptive detachment
regarding the represented referential the person and the scene
Translated by Ana Carolina Azevedo that figurate in the process main image until it edges its
own loss.
ABSTRACT: This brief essay was based on the subject Processos Such translations comprehend crossings between different visual
Hbridos na Arte Contempornea (Hybrid processes in contemporary medias. They can be considered as much from the concept of
art), lectured by professor Sandra Ray in the Post-Graduation course hybridism than from that of cross-breeding. This essays guiding
of Visual Arts, UFRGS. Here will be presented some of the main ideas thought is the (possible) appliance of such concepts in the above
of the research on visual poetics that is being developed in the mentioned research. However, to understand this thought, a
course, punctually considering the concepts of cross-breeding and recapitulation of some of the main processual aspects that constitute
hybridism and their respective applications as theoretical instruments. the research is in order.
The research encompasses photography means (as the producer of Initially, a wide series of appropriated images of cinematographic
images that, through a precise process, are faithfully painted) and scenes was built. These scenes were uniquely photographed in
paintings means (as the result) in its intersections, being its main front of a television screen. The photography cuts a piece in the
historical referential the Hyperrealist movement. original field of the specific kind of scene that was chosen for this
proposition: the closeup.
KEYWORDS: contemporary painting, cross-breeding, hybridism, The utilized films were taken from a drain of intense cinematographic
photography, videographic image. production transformed into video during the last three decades
(in this specific case, into VHS), and are labeled film-excess in the
The research I am currently working on in my Visual Arts doctorate' research. Found in stores that commercialized video rental shops
s (with visual poetics as its main point) has been temporarily named cast-offs, such videos are situated in the core of proper unfoldings
Rarefao: Paradoxos Imagticos (Rarefaction: Imagetic Paradoxes) for the flow of current images. This is an already familiarized
and encompasses in terms of a practical work the means overview in the flow of current images unfoldings and it determined
of photography and painting. consequently automatized perceptions.
My main goal is to investigate determined imagetic transpositions Indeed, this researchs hypothesis has as its premise the fact that
between video, photo and painting, its final destination. Such nowadays the narrative experience for the largest part of us is
transpositions have been called translations in my research. That is permeated and determined by photography, by cinema and by
because it comes from the understanding of the notion of translation, television in its mediatic insertions and conjunctions or, as
which indicates the presence of some level of interpretation and Paul Virilio ponderates, permeated and determined according to the
alternation is more suitable than not. This term is understood as subsequent eras of the different kinds of imagetic devices.
such in the following quote: This unfolding, this superexposition, this detachment of the eye in
regards to direct perception of the real world and its respective
() first, we have to grasp the senses of products of another representation in painting is precisely my researchs starting line.
culture; then, we must recreate them in the terms of yet another I identify such detachment as translated in the works of some
144 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
contemporary punctual painters such as Gerhard Richter and Chuck from the video does not privilege what was visualized. That is to
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Close. This reading is based mainly (but not only) upon in the fact say, the re-presentation of the original cinematographic referential
that such artists use photographies as foundation for the imagetic (once the interferences and noises from the video are added to
construction in their paintings. the photo invariably) is the visually immersive experience occurred
This research attempts to draw on paintings that copy the image during the act of videographic register.
of a photograph in the current days, and from its point of view, This photographs referential is not the same of the cinematographic
the pictorial technique used by Hyperrealist painters represents camera (which is, in this case, the actors and actresses faces), for it
the culmination of technical and historical imbrication between becomes the television apparatus itself, more specifically its screen.
the means of painting and photography. It does so because it What the photograph thus reveal is not only a piece of the films
proposes a radicalization of the systematic pictorial figurative image, but mainly the moment of direct contact with the exhibition
in its visual approach to photographic means (apparently and of the same film (my action as a photographer facing the television
superficially corresponding to the complexity of observable reality) on in a private place).
transposing a photographic image to the pictorial plane, considering As previously observed, with this processual stage in mind, video
and being attentive to all the idiosyncrasies of the photographical films used for the capturing of images utilized in this research
optic construction (such as a series of asymmetries in the pictures, (fig.3) constitute a condition that I will hereby call film-excess.
not to mention planes brought out of focus, characteristic of the In this sense, some specificities were taken into consideration:
deepness of field). these videos did not arrive at the brazilian market with statutes
The photographic image appropriated in the researchs process is, identical to their exhibition and commercialization in their original
then, faithfully, manually and thoroughly copied in painting, from dot cinematographic market (and, in this case, it constitutes another
to dot of the video-graphic image, through the painting process specificity of the appropriated object to its north-american origin).
which uses only paint, pencils and a canvas. However, the utilized In the first place, this change in the original statute the movie had is
canvas here was an iron plate, which is mechanical and industrial, due to the quantitative disparities between the huge cinematographic
such as the (acrylic) paint and the utilization of the slide projector production and the consumer market already existing in Brazil. It was
that supplies the photographed image as a guide for the painting. (and still is) quite common that most part of the cinematographic
The painting is done during all the processs time only movies filmed and exhibited in the United States is available in
when the projection of the photographic slide is turned on, which Brazil only as VHS (in the past) and DVD (nowadays). That is because
forces the projector to stay on during every hour that compose the there is not enough consumers in Brazil for such a great amount
paintings elaboration. That results in the slide suffering little by little of cinematographic production.
degradations from light and heat from the projectors lightbulb. That In the second place, for the national audiovisual market to make
is to say, the slide will literally melt during the whole process (fig.1). possible the transposition of a foreign narrative production into
This way, the visual referential that I use for painting images also the brazilian market, the need for translating it into the countrys
disappear in the course of painting it. This diversion from what should spoken language is established. Thus, the original movie is dubbed
have been initially planned and imagined in the instance previous by voices that replace the former ones. Another way is to input
to the whole process is what determines a de-saturated (faded) subtitles, which will translate to Portuguese each sentence uttered
appearance in the finished work (fig.2). Among many implications, by the movie actors, or each written word that may be in the
such a process deliberately promotes a break from the illusion and scene. This way, as subtle as such changes may be, in regards to the
visual deepening, thus pointing the interference from video and comprehension and interpretation of the movie, it is observable that
photography means over the cinematographic image. even tiny marks and insertions provoke modifications in the semantic
Thus, accounting for the fact that photography invariably carries integrity of any visual work or audiovisual work, in this case.
with it its referential, when a photo is transposed to painting, its Such particular aspects are not understood here as arbitrary. Much
original character is fundamentally altered in its semantics. While to the contrary, it comes from a notion that, besides impregnating
photography shows tangible representation of a previous reality, the image with visual strengthening characteristics of the film-
painting is here considered inexorably as a manual creation. excess notion, such aspects also show and manifest political senses.
Again, a paradox is established, in which the photo appropriated For, according to Virilio, today, who would be to deny that the
RICARDO PERUFO MELLO, Rarefaction: imagetic paradoxes 145
POLIS, which lent its etymology to the word POLITICS, belongs to the concept of hybridization suggests the impossibility of complete
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the realm of perception facts? (1993, p.22). Being the substantive fusion between different components of a relation (2005, p.28),
of Greek origins, polis is a synonym for city as understood in being thus the result of an approximation of different terms
the sense of organized community, formed by citizens. that may never be complete (p.29), the theorist Icleia Cattani
It seems to become clear that the intercultural role taken by cinema suggests that:
and its situation in the globalizing process in which the cultural
industries' flow act among worldwide markets. Upon that, as said The crossings that raise relations towards cross-breeding are
by Nstor Canclini, to the classic modalities of fusion, derived the ones that lodge multiple meanings, remaining in tension in
from migrations, exchanges, commercial exchanges and integrating the work of art from a principle of aggregation that does not
educational policies pushed by the national states, cultural industries- seek to join them into an unique totality, but to keep them
generated mixtures are added (2000, p.XXXI) in constant pulsation. These tense crossings are what constitute
It is precisely this vast world market stablished by cultural cross-breedings in current artistic processes. (2007, p.11)
cinematographic industry that, as was formerly pointed out, rose that
which I identify as film-excess. A very predictable and repetitive In this sense, I believe that, as Canclini says, the concepts are relevant
cultural product in its aesthetic and script-wise solutions because in the measure that the epistemological operations () situate
of its condition of product elaborated from guidelines overridingly its explanatory fecundity and its limitations in the interior of the
marketing, once: cultural discourses: should they allow or not to understand better
something that as of today remained unexplained?. (2000, p.XXI)
The aesthetic innovation is day by day less interesting to It is through the concept of cross-breeding in the context of
museums, editors and cinema; it was dislocated to the electronic contemporary art, as used by the critic and curator Iclia Cattani,
technologies, musical entertainment and fashion. Where once were that the concept will serve as an auxiliary theoretical tool by
painters or musicians, there are designers and discjockeys. The considering itself as a painting that integrates other means, but
hybridization, in a way, was made easier and became multiple does not join them homogeneously or completely, let alone develops
when depending not of lengthy time, artisan or erudite patience, them as excluding. This choice is also due to theoretical trajectory
but of the skills to generate hypertexts and quick audiovisual or affinities through which Cattani traces the range and limitations of
electronic editing. (2000, p.XXXV-XXXXVI) the specific usage that suggests from the concept.
The referential historic foundation from which the researchs work
This kind of situation, which requires lengthy time and artisan has initially developed Pop art and Hyperrealist movements
patience, is what I intend to incite in the researchs work process. was precisely known for operating, in an explicit manner,
Not in the sense of simply stablishing a counterposition to the such tense crossings. For, since the year of 1975, there was the
contemporary scenery described above, but as a situation of work progressive outbreak of languages and forms abandoned amidst
inserted in the logics of the referred notion of hybridization modernity, accompanied by mixtures of elements which give way to
term that the author understands as processes that match structures cross-breedings or hybridizations (CATTANI, 2007, p.22).
or practices which generate new structures, objects and practices. The theorist also affirmates that this process was even more
Despite the hybridization concepts mentioning, the research opted by emphasized in contemporary times, saying that in opposing nature,
approaching its imagetic crossings between different medias through production () accepts the contaminations provoked by coexistence
the concept of cross-breeding. This concept presupposes equally the of different and opposing elements between itself (p.22).
idea of a mixture between two distinct and dissociated identities in Notwithstanding, the concept of cross-breeding does not only refer
their individual qualities responsible for generating a third entity, to only different means, procedures and techniques inserted in the
which carries aspects from both of its generators. Notwithstanding, same work, but also to different species of situations of the sign
in general terms, they may be considered correlated concepts, but (indicated and symbolic) dialoguing in a plane, as in the case of
it is observable that there is some discrepancy between theorists conjunction of textual subtitles and the image of cinematographic
ideas of the semantic particularities of each one of both terms. origin present in the paintings of this research. There is precisely
For example, whilst the critic Moacir dos Anjos understands that the cross-breeding of coexistence of images and words, whose sense
146 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
themselves, mutually (p.22). ANJOS, Moacir dos. Local/Global: Arte em Trnsito. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Ed.,
Still in regards to the conceptual divergence between hybridization 2005.
and cross-breeding, there is another ponderation made by Canclini BARTHES, Roland. A Cmara Clara: nota sobre a fotografia. Rio de Janeiro:
that considers that maybe the decisive issue is not to establish which Nova Fronteira, 1984.
one of these concepts () is more fertile, but how to keep building CANCLINI, Nstor Garca. Culturas Hbridas: Estratgias para entrar e sair da
theoretical principles and methodological procedures that help us modernidade. So Paulo: EDUSP, 2000.
to transform this world into a more translatable, that is to say, CATTANI, Icleia Borsa (Org.). Mestiagens na arte contempornea. Porto
more prone to cohabitation, amidst its differences (2000, p.XXXIX). Alegre: Editora da UFRGS, 2007.
Therefore, as previously said, in this sense I emphasize the importance LUCIE-SMITH, E. Art Now, from abstract Expressionism to Superrealism. New York:
of the specific cut made from the cultural production field here William Morrow & Company INC, 1981.
elected as a starting line for the elaboration of the research work. RICHTER, G. Notas, 1964-1965. In: FERREIRA, G.; COTRIM, C. (Orgs.). Escritos de
That is, the usage of true refuges found in the edges of production, Artistas: anos 60/70, Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Ed., 2006.
resulting from a massive cinematographic industry which here VIRILIO, Paul. A mquina de viso. Rio de Janeiro: Jos Olympio, 2002.
generates a deliberately cross-bred image, one that is not soluble ___________. O espao crtico. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. 34, 1993.
in its final media statute.
did not attend any art courses; he had to learn how to paint on
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his own, by looking at things, at his own paintings and otherss,
which is not in fact an issue. The most important question towards
this point is not about being self-taught, but to be a provincial
self-taught person, as he is. Born in 1909 in Marechal Mallet,
countryside of Paran, Brazil, Bakun began painting in Curitiba, in
the beginning of the 30s, where he lived and worked up to the
SCATTERED NATURE: MIGUEL BAKUN day he died, in 1963. In this period, and overall during the decades
Artur Freitas of 1940 and the 50s, when he was at his fullest, the circuit of art
in Curitiba already existed, but was as fragile as a castle made of
ABSTRACT: The painter Miguel Bakun worked during the 1940s cards. The trade of works of art, for example, notwithstanding some
and 1950s and his paintings are little known in the Brazilian art rare private orders, restrains itself to what was seen and bought
historiography. Bakuns paintings can be interpreted as a way of through the displays of the few stores in XV Street, downtown. The
questioning the dichotomy between academic and modern in consecration of artists, a necessity flavored by domestic fights, is
Brazilian context. This questioning is interesting for an expanded due to award-givings of two annual available events, the Salo
understanding of Brazilian art in the first half of the 20th century. Paranaense created in 1944 and the Salo da Primavera, in 1947.
Art criticism, in its turn, demonstrates more good will than visual
KEYWORDS: Miguel Bakun, Brazilian art, Modernism understanding, and in general is done by humanist and romantic
attorneys which must actually explain why the best texts on art
THE BAKUN ISSUE at the time were written not by critics, but by artists themselves, as
is the case of the Joaquim magazine, which went around between
Miguel Bakun is one of those painters we may call pictorial. Thats 1946 and 1948. And, in the end, as to the formal education in
right, as redundant as it is: a pictorial painter. One of those who visual arts, its worth reminding that 1948 was the year in which
believes in the viscous handling of paint, in the loaded palette, in the states public power inaugurated the Paran School of Music
the fat stroke of the brush, which delays the eye and appeals to and Visual and Performing Arts (Escola de msica e belas artes do
the touch. Not that there is no drawing in there; its just that, for Paran) or Belas , which, until the 70s, was the only option
Bakun, the act of drawing, fundamentally clumsy, is almost always for a higher level of education for the artists living in that region.
the result, not the cause of the act of painting. In his paintings, it Almost forty years old and little keen to theoretical discussions,
isnt rare, for example, for the edges to the painted areas to be Bakun avoids the school environment of the Visual and Performing
fluid, slippery a little ill-behaved, I would say, towards the linear Arts just where his colleagues Guido Viaro and Theodoro de
structure of the objects. For this reason, in most of his paintings, Bona would be lecturing and where all future modern generations
colors is not the filling colors, but a kind of matter imperative. would be studying from the year of 1950 on. On the other hand,
From lawns to fences, from houses to trees and painted bushes, the events, these ephemeral and illusory oasis of celebration, would
its the plastering that literally builds the spaces and goes forth soon be a true obsession to the artist: from 1947 to 1962, Bakun
from one side to another, seeking to dilute frontiers of objects that would be in no less than 29 of these 32 local events, and awarded
now always fit its own margins. Pictorial matter, for Bakun, is by at them 16 times. Not that that means much. Doubtlessly, Bakun
definition a subject in itself, but a deviated one, sometimes rude was relatively known, unless in the context of Curitiba: he took
and clumsy, although always honest and unforeseen anyhow, part in all events in Paran he desired, got awarded in some of
one of the many forms that the experience of modern painting them, calls the criticss attention and has few but important local
took on in the contradictory context of Brazilian art. MECENAS, among which a states governor. The problem, as I see
As a descendant of Slavs and the son of a railwayman of little wealth, it the Bakun issue, as I like to call it , was not necessarily
Miguel Bakun posesses poor art education. In one quick research, of knowledge, but of understandment.
every newspaper article, catalogue text or headword will describe Bakuns painting, overall his scenery painting, with all that viscous
him in the same way: as a self-taught painter. And truthfully, Bakun and confuse paint, that UNPRECISE drawing and that flat spaciality,
148 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
represents a fracture in the understandment of art that went and-dark and the evoking of depth, in first place, are the logics of
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around at the time. In general terms, we could say that Bakuns naturalistic drawing. On the other side and here there is no
Curitiba, in the AF of self-modernization, lets out the terms of contradiction its exactly the safety of drawing, allied to the
the eternal conflict between academics and moderns, in such a romantic taste of sketching, that will make appear in these same
fashion that makes Bakuns painting able to be recognized, but not artists the taste for the called PAINTING OF STAINS - PINTURA DE
understood. Schematizing, Curitiba from the 40s to the 50s, among MANCHAS. In these conditions, the brushstroke frees itself ma non
a thousand changes, tends to counterpose two contrary forces: the troppo, for it expands itself to the limits of perceived nature. Its
legacy of the norwegian painter Alfredo Andersen in the academic evidently not about impressionism, because theres nothing there
side, and the strong presence of the italian painter Guido Viaro, in that suggests the systematic analysis of light and perception. The
the modern side. Facing this polarization which in some way free and visible brushstroke, in these paintings, is only a luminous
demonstrates more general problems than brazilian painting , and punctual effect: a general evokation of a plausible atmosphere
Bakuns word always rises unfit, and its inevitably misunderstood at its best. As had already occurred in the case of the Grimm
which, by the way, is actually a virtue, if we can place the group, in Rio de Janeiro, the Andersenian PINTURA DE MANCHAS
artists work facing these two poles. is interested with the flowing aspect of the brushstroke not when
its destructible, but only when it highlights the spacial imperatives
ACADEMICS AND MODERNS IN BAKUNS CURITIBA of correct drawing.
In the end of the 40s, and overall in the 50s, the post-war
Starting off with the first pole, we need to perceive, right off, that politization and the internationalization of modernity conflicts end
its not possible to literally interpret what was called, at the time, up putting in crisis the stable world of academic painting, even
academic. The term, basically pejorative, is IMPRECISE enough to in Curitiba. The magazine Joaquim engages in an open campaign
label, without sugarcoating, each and every painting that based against the Andersen legacy and spreads throughout the city an
itself in the space limitations of the naturalist system. In the case officious modernism, well-anchored in icons such as Portinari and
of Curitiba, academics are, overall, the pupils of Andersen, that Di Cavalcanti. Bakun, in his turn, finds himself in the middle of
is, a small but varied group of painters that had been through a cross-fire and had some difficulty situating himself. Adopted by
the Curitibean atelier of the norwegian master, and shared the modernist forces, the artist has an exotic feature, kind of out
falvors of an electic PAISAGISMO->SCENERY-MAKING with him, in a of control, and his drawing couldnt be called correct; but hes
rather fin-de-sicle fashion. Deceased in 1935, Alfredo Andersen stil a local scenery painter a landscaper whose brushstrokes,
left in Curitiba a whole generation of pupils. These are artists like misinterpreted as MANCHAS, guarantee himself some renown even
Freyesleben, Estanislau Traple, Lange de Morretes, Joo Ghelfi and, in in the most conservative local events.
parts, Theodoro De Bona artists that, despite lack of national In the context of conflict between academics and moderns, the
projection, were essential to the formation of a local circuit of art. italian Guido Viaro rises up as the synthesis-figure of the will of
Surely, these arent artists in equality to each other; even so, its artistic renovation in Curitiba. Its, as has already been said, about
possible to see masters and pupils among them , a common core our second pole of discussion. Just like Alfredo Andersen, Viaro was
of objectives and procedures. able to converge around himself, through teaching and his own
For example, with Andersen, they all learnt something visible in work, a whole generation of younger artists. But unlike Andersen,
their paintings something that the old master called the truth the italian didnt have to foundate a means of art; his idea was
of nature. It regarded, then, supposing that it wasnt properly to simply update it in regards to what was at the time taken to
nature, but natural perception of things the right guide for be modern and certainly the legacy of Andersen didnt fit
appreciation and judgement in the act of painting. Andersen loathed the plans, unless as a villain to be defeated. By the end of the 40s,
the usage of prints and photographs in his classes and demanded with Viaros and also Potys participation in the Joaquim magazine,
from his students the direct experience of looking, the exhaustive the kind of renovation that interests the next generations starts
practice of drawing, together with the understanding of the linear to get clearer. In opposition fo the victory of natural perception,
perspective. In the academics context, therefore, what rules the all of it anchored to the equilibrium between nature spaciality
limitations and overlapping of objects, the VOLUMETRIA of light- and perspective rationality, the new conception of painting ends up
ARTUR FREITAS, Scattered nature: Miguel Bakun 149
taking into consideration other devices of signification, such as the to the theme of suicide or any of his lifes neverending oddities. In
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deformation of figures, the synthesis of visual information and the the same way and I hope to be forgiven by the reader , I
spacial compression of planes. say that I will not approach in this text his few but comprehensively
Anyway, its also necessary to affirm that the renewed painting in known animist paintings. Much to the contrary: here, my idea is
Bakuns Curitiba, in the end, owes less to modern painting, understood to actually help to interpret a side of Bakun yet little explored.
in a wide sense, than to the modernist graphic arts properly speaking. From 1946 to mid-50s, approximately, Miguel Bakun ellaborates and
It may sound a bit odd, but it we have in mind the importance deepens those who would become the main elements of his work.
of illustrations in the Joaquim magazine and overall the interest This, we can say, is the moment of his poetic construction. From
that the Engraving clubs would arise in Paran as they did, we will then on, it begins to become obvious that Bakuns trajectory doesnt
understand that the matrix of these transformations is more of a present a linear development, because its made more of comings
graphic order, say, than of a pictorial order per se. By the way, and goings than of successive advances. Awarded in almost every
such privilege of drawing seems to be a characteristic not only local event since the end of the 40s, the artists works follow a
of Paran modernism, but of Brazilian modernism as a whole. In curious itinerary: there moderately accepted between academics and
both cases, the passage of an academic visuality to a modern moderns for they allow thin approaches to both sides but
one occurs without the mediation of a pictorial experience of basically different from both, overall in its way of structurizing space
impressionism, which brings the artists to jump from a graphic and conceiving matter. Replacing the logic of the naturalist system
conception to another. Unlike the European case, in Brazil, its or the disfigurations of modernist drawing, Miguel Bakuns painting
possible to go from Pedro Alexandrino to Di Cavalcanti or from ends up divided between a dispersive treatment and a liquefied
Andersen to Viario without necessarily having to understand the brushstrok.e In this way, facing a context that has everything to
journey of painters less adjusted to such dichotomy which may think overall of the paper in the drawing of painting, his pictorial
perhaps explain something about the origins of the Bakun issue. painting has always been a mystery to unfold. Already in 1946 and
47, for example, it is justly through drawing, or better, through
THE DISPERSATION OF SCENERY: FIRST NOTES its difficulty or lacking, that criticism approached his rough and
fleshy paintings: Nelson Luz talks of a staggering drawing; Osvaldo
Miguel Bakuns painting suffers from a chronic issue of evaluation: Nascimento says that the drawing is faced in a secondary plane;
even if it is the work of a modern painter and great landscaper, while Armando Ribeiro Pinto notes the absence of architectural
such paintings were little studied as languages and even less as structure in such painting. Theyre all right; but at that point, only
landscapes. Such disproportion between work and judgement, in my Guido Viaro was able to notice a lacking in virtue. Bakuns paintings,
understanding, owes itself to the dissemination, in the field of art, according to Viaro, suggest a lacking of drawing that resembles
of that what I call the anectode seduction, that is, the seduction more a coat of arms than a real lacking; in those paintings, he
for that order of explanations whose arguments are based in concludes, theres an elimination of air in the sceneries as if it was
the authors biographical strange facts than in the specificities of a physics experiment. And its true: in Bakuns work, to eliminate
his work. Well, the fact is that the case of the artist, under this the air that is, to make difficult the atmospheric evoking of
perspective, becomes really an exemplary case. Living, Miguel Bakun a deep and naturalistic space happens precisely because of
was a much weird character, tormented, religious, full of manias, with the lack of drawing, of the handling of pictorial matter, and not
a biography filled with anecdotes. Dead, Bakun is stalked, victimized, in the linear deformation of planes and outlines, something typical
a misundestood genius, a martyr that refuses the systems stupidity of the modernist key.
and in the end hangs himself with a rope, in the back of his own Particularly keen on this aspect is the case of a small scenery by
house. For these and for others, as its well-known, the artist was Bakun, painted on card paper and dated as of 4th of July of 1946
nicknamed Parans Van Gogh what ended up becoming, with (fig. 1). In it, some of the main poetic makeshifts of the artist are
respect towards his work, one more slope in the road than an already present. Painted over a precarious support, the painting,
appropriated key to reading. which represents an isolated house in the middle of the scenery,
In this way, I say from the beginning that I intend, in the next presents an expeditious treatment that contrasts with the small
pages, to approach Bakuns scenery painting without, however, recurr dimensions of the card. Although its signed and dated, the painting
150 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
resembles something like a practice one of those quick and Still under this dispersive effect of scenery, another important
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incomplete sketches to which tradition would reccomend better painting is Entrada do tanque de Bacacheri (The entering of the
widening on a bigger and definitive support. However, for Bakun, Bacacheri tank), also from the 40s (fig. 2). Its a small oil on canvas
being incomplete is in itself a complete source of signification. The in which the artist represented the surroundings of the Bacacheri
artist, who always thinks figuratively, seems to trust in the observers neighbourhoods lake, in Curitiba, an old leisure spot in the city. In
ability of visual reading, since that, in general, allows him to have a this work, its the lakes surface, not the vegetation anymore, that
more active role in the interpretation of the imagery of his work. predominates in the painting. The horizon, the superior limit located
Its not rare, in this sense, that the descriptive clarity end up in right above a narrow strip of grass, is higher than in the previous
conflict with a kind of feature that I would like to call ostensible, painting and leaves an even smaller portion of space for the sky.
for its actually willing to show off the vestiges of its own doings. Although its a leisure spot, the scenery is emptied of human traces:
In this painting dated of 1946, for example, the horizon, which is there are no constructions or characters, apart from three small
relatively high, ends up dividing the scenery in two distinct patterns ambiguous touches of dark paint people or bushes? that
of showcasing features. The first, more timid, and situated in the call attention to the centre and further down the lawn, next to a
superior third ofthe composition, consists in a whitened blue area bigger bush. As an axis to the painting, nature interests Bakun as
that is more of a form of covering the support than properly a way much as the showoff act of painting it.
of evoking, for example, the celestial infinity. There, the brushstrokes, In this work, the movement of paint now takes over a less rebellious
visible and stretched over themselves, dont connect by the injunctions and dramatic character. On another hand, the brushstrokes and
of a visual effect: they are born by necessity of covering, as if spreadingss sense is still very visible and bases itself in a subtle
that blue and white net wasnt really necessary for the apperance game of oppositions. The author counterposes the horizontal touches
of a sky in the painting. On another hand, below the horizon, of water and sky, which are predominant in the painting, to a series
the process is inverted: in regards to the support, its not about of opposed movements: vertical traces in three green ravines to the
chosing between covering it up or leaving it to show anymore; whats left; diagonal spreadings in the yellowed field to the background, and
interesting in the painting of that vegetation is justly the disturbed convulse and impredictable movements in two dark blocs of trees
and vibrating interaction, in this case, between paint and card. In to the right and to the left. Even so, its not only the articulated
these circumstances, in a terrestrial plane, Bakun counterposes the and internal game of paint that gives to the painting its flickering
placidity of a sky that is brushed by paint to an electric and air. Lught, in this work, was not poured down the objects as usual:
ruidous nature that builds itself in the alternancy between covering is simply came off from inside them from within the boles
and showing, giving origin to a conflict of contraries in which the and branches, lawns and clouds, from the reflexes on the lake.
background, thus, becomes both color and image. Between contorted Again, it is the alternancy between paint and support that evokes
spreadings of blue, green and white paints, the raw hazelnut color such vibrating character of painting, with the exception being the
of the card escapes in intervals of paint and invades the scenery, luminous vibration, diffused all around, irradiated from within, from
reassuring the flowing of objects represented there. In the thrill of the bottom, from behind things, that is: comes from the canvass
the relations between mass and emptiness, the drawing dissipates blank. In a way, its like the diffuse effect in this painting was a
in gesture, and there is no visual limitation that convinces us of part of a downtempo labor of sight as if the constant absence
the limits of things that convinces us, for example, that a tree of paint didnt amount to more than a pretext for a deviated
or a bush ends here or begins there. perception of boles, branches and clouds, or even of reflexes, passages,
Therefore, thats how the artist offers us, in one painting only, two outlines. Distant from the naturalist atmosphere, Entrada do tanque
forms of showcasing the feature: on one side, by concealment, as do Bacacheri seems to come from a parallel worl, made out of the
in a covering sky, which in this case is less a vision of the infinite mixture of luminous sparks and grimes.
than a way of covering with paint a piece of support; and in
another side, by means of dispersion, as is the case of disturbed DEVIATED NATURE
vegetation in the scenery, that here corresponds to the vibrating
effect that results from nervous, incomplete procedures, and for that In the realm of scenery, the evident devotion of Bakun towards
reason are permeable to the showcasing apparition of the support. nature is closer to the dimension of humble love than properly
ARTUR FREITAS, Scattered nature: Miguel Bakun 151
to those of drama or tragedy. In the only known testimonial by four houses, paired, divide an exiguous space, where they fit with
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the artist, a manuscript of May 1960 which lies in the Museum accuracy, squeezed in a flattened rectangle that goes from the
of Contemporary Art of Paran, Bakun assures that his conception horizons shaggy vegetation to the real limitations of the painting.
of painting was not in the drawing, forms, or colors. The artist At the housess feet, a narrow strip of grayish-brown land, formed
explains: in a certain moment, I began looking for God and I by viscous spreadings, goes through the painting from one side
observed that He was in the flowers, the fruits and the colors. Life, to another, dividing the composition in two unequal areas. From
light and movement are qualities that I revive in my paintings. there downwards, all the paintings field is now dominated by the
Considered thus in a delicately affectionate and religious register, presence of the lake, with its ravines and reflexes.
the artists posture seems to be different, for example, from the The water, in this work, aside from providing the weight and measure
exemplary postures of the romantic key. For him, the intense emotions of the canvass visual field, is also a source of discrete perceptive
of the natural world dont depend on the grandiloquent expression instability. However, contrariwise to Entrada do tanque do Bacacheri,
of wide, sublime and eventually awe-inspiring sceneries by analogy. Paisagem doesnt affirm such instability through the alternancy
Natures beauty isnt in its monumental character, but, much to the between paint and background: even when its visible, the canvass
contrary, in its most absolute simplicity. Of a widely known timid web doesnt appear in a systematic way, and restrains itself to
temper, Bakun incorporated the shyness and introversion of his some points of the houses or the earth. The strategy, thus, is now
own field of art, in order to potentialize it as a virtue. A rough different, and consists basically in exploring the plastic ambiguity of
abridgment would be to affirm that the more the artists sceneries the water mirror. Utilizing a high horizon, Bakun takes advantage
are unplugged from the debates between modernists and academics, of the lakes extension and the flowing of reflexes in the inferior
the more they will find their own poetic dimension, so that before portion of the painting to recover, as an image, the flatenned or
they get it right they have to get it wrong twice. Dislocated, absent universe in the superior portion, as is the case of the sky,
therefore, from the perspective of a context that opposes naturalist the houses and some trees. Such recovering, however, is never mere
drawing to the graphic solutions of modernism, Miguel Bakun ends application of reflexive logics of images. Much to the contrary: it
up closing himself into a kind of liturgy of simplicity. In it, the is as if that waters placidity wasnt servicing the contemplation,
natural beautiful, unending symptom of natures good will towards but the doubt. We see in the lake, for example, that three inverted
men, needs to be saluted in some way, and the pictorial handling Araucaria trees reappear as ghosts and dominate the composition,
of a small scenery is still a symptom, precisely, of the good will of echoing in their crowns the horizontality of four ravines that emerge
men towards nature. Contrary to the discussions about art, Bakun right about from the water. The Araucariass trunks go forth up to
takes over an almost ingenuous empirism and goes around Curitiba, two ravines, but curiously they dont proceed up them, as it would
where he finds out the simplicity of invisible places, indefinite spaces, have been expected. Between both raivnes and solid ground, situated
mere background yards or roadsides. In short, Bakun builds, with his right above, the reflexes of trunks simply disappear, as if the aquatic
sceneries, a simple iconography, in which the plasticity of forgotten images referred to total or partially invisible trees. By the way, in
nooks is as much a inconscient reaction towards the field of art as the world of reflexes, the smallest of the three Araucarias doesnt
a form of affinity towards the bucolic context of Bakuns Curitiba. even have a trunk and seems to fluctuate above a parallel universe
Painted in July 4th, 1947, Paisagem (Scenery) is a good example in which gravity doesnt exist and mirrors dont mirror.
of this alliance between naturalist humbleness, pictorial paintings A little to the right, also in the water, we can see the inverted
and simply iconography, overall if we take into consideration some images of a white house and a unknown tree. Contrariwise to the
procedures with which the artist encloses, in the painting, such Araucarias, now its possible to identify in the scenery the reflected
relations (fig. 3). In it, Bakun sees nature as someone who wanders objects, for we find in the terrestrial plane its correspondent houses
in the emptiness, looking down, absorbed, halfway concentrating and trees. On another hand, again, its through the absence, not the
between what he has in front of his eyes and what he has inside. presence, that Bakun mixes naturalist rationality. Like a playful mirror,
Representing a lake with houses on its margins, Paisagem is one the lake seems to be able to chose what its going to reflect and
more Bakunian painting of high horizon, one of those that seem to what it wont. And indeed, only one of the four houses is reflected
compress the sky as if it were a needed supporting character to on it even though, in a terrestrial environment, all of them are
natures leading disposition. In the superior portion of the painting, lined up and situated at the same distance from the gaze. On the
152 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
water, the horizons straightness, which at first should determine that equally liquefied, precise and vertical, or even in those four cars
ENGLISH
everything in the scenery grows from the same ground, becomes parked in the street, painted in one turn only.
unstable and disarranged. The tree on the rights reflection comes Another important work that works with fluid strokes, although
from a ravine different from the one from which comes the houses now theyre seen as alternated areas of plastering and raw canvas,
reflection. That aside, theres also all that pool situated between is Porta dos sonhos (Door to dreams), a small oil on canvas,
the ravines and solid ground, where the blue reflected from the sky probably painted in the beginning of the 50s (fig. 5). To a certain
occupies exactly the place of the grounds reflection, which should degree, this paintings doesnt only relate diverse former pictorial
be there. Paisagem, in short, is a nice example of how Bakuns procedures: it makes of its own relation a poetic subject. In it,
subtle iconography, made of simple excerpts from nature, doesnt the artist works with a game of openings and closings, which, not
stop the confluence of unstable senses, as is the case of ground by chance, correspond to distinct but complementary features. The
that becomes sky in water or vice-versa. look, in this work, resembles that of a spy or a voyeur: we see
without being seen, from crevice to crevice, advancing into others
LIQUID AND WILD: BAKUNIAN FEATURES personal lives. In the field of imagery, were protected behind a
dense foliage, which covers, in the pictorial field and in a circular
Simultaneously, in other works, the artist begins to make use of manner, all borders of the canvas, from high up to down low. Just
a feature we may call liquid. In general, its a form of covering ahead, through the vegetal disorder, we see the detail of a house.
support through straight, long, liquefied brushstrokes, generally used In the boarded walls, a very small portion of the houses interior
in the construction of objects that are also long, as trees, fences escapes through the crevice of an indiscrete door that is ajar
and boards. A clarifying example in this subject is Praa Tiradentes, and soon we realize: were snooping in.
a small oil on canvas painted by Bakun still in the 40s (fig. 4). Although, what we truly see is only a promise of a look. All intimacy
Except from the yellowish foliage, almost everything that you see of the house is shortened to a streak of minimal horizontal strokes.
in this painting softens into a flowing, slippery trait. The contrasts, In counterposition, we also notice the decisive vertical presence of
marked in other paintings, now weaken into translucent visuality. the boards on the door. As is the case of the buildings and cars
In between brushstrokes, the canvas reappears, punctuating shades in Praa Tiradentes, were facing once again a certain geometry
of white that have roles of themselves. Once more, were facing a that is however unstable liquidly organized. The difference now
feature thats showing itself off and therefore is up to showcasing is the degree of precision. In Porta dos sonhos, the house door is
its internal pictorial procedures, with the difference that now the made of an unusual material, in which act and thing are mixed
dispersion of the scenery isnt in the spreadings vibration, as in up: each board is a gesture and in each gesture is a board as
Bakuns turbulent vegetations, but in the liquefied effect of the a matter of fact, its a situation that is taken to the extreme just
brushstrokes. Its not in vain that Praa Tiradentes is an urban ahead, where two almost magic strokes, straight as a ruler, cut the
scenery, a main spot in Curitiba where, in the place of parks and space and lean on the walls, under the form of two thin beams.
streams, predominate the buildings, concrete and asphalt. On another hand, contrasting with this liquefied but civilized world,
In the citys scenery, the geometric edges of walls and cars are Bakun cant help himself and spills right around it all, in the savage
smoothed in the sinuous character of the brushstrokes. The drawings world of vegetation, a huge load of leaves and flowers and limbs
limits are fluid and pleasantly smooth, as if a part of the humor and twigs that are spinned into a barbarious feature. Once again,
had infiltrated in the scenery and forced the perspective to shake. its the relation between the plastering of paint and the uncovered
The buildings seem to be made of jelly, what, in a good measure, background that shakes the dispersion of scenery. The shock between
ows itself to the brushs ostensible work. The buildings big bluish both features the houses on one side and the vegetation that
wall to the right is an example: all the left side of this wall is surrounds it in the other seems to confirm the shock between
made of a single, liquid and certain stroke, that begins in the two worlds: yes, nature wants to engulf human vestiges, and its
beginning and ends at the end, where it has to, defying a smoothed, about to. As a result, the dispersive treatment of the plane comes
but curiously precise verticality almost an exact science of the into conflict with the looks voyeurism and tends to take over the
inexact. And we find the same in other spots in the painting, as canvas. Ostensible as a coated wall, the rough feature of nature
in the high ocher building to the left, made of strokes that are spreads from the canvass edges inwards and planes the painting.
ARTUR FREITAS, Scattered nature: Miguel Bakun 153
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flattening of the visual field is noticeable in other paintings from
the 50s, as is the exemplary case of Na clareira (In the clearing),
painted around the year of 1957 (fig. 6). In this work, all the
paintings space is invaded by the unstable oscillating of nature. In
a soft plonge, the horizon escapes by the air up high and makes
us look down. The angle, actually, is a little odd: Bakun seems to
have pulled the scenery by its leg, as if it were possible to knock
the whole scene down, folding it over the paintings plane itself.
The sky, already squeezed in other works, now doesnt even fit the
canvas; what remains is only the continuous dispersion of a ground
that is made of trees and foliage and lawn, all at the same time.
As a strategist in combat, the artist doesnt paint a painting: he
occupies all spaces, advancing with his turbulent plastering over each
centimeter of the canvas. Almost in the center of it, a couple moves
with difficulty, midway to sitting on the landscape and dissipate in
the viscous plastering of paint. The narrative, lacking and vague, is
nothing more than a pretext for the pictorial ravishments of painting.
In a sense, as occurs in other similar paintings of Bakuns, Na Clareira
synthetizes something important in the Bakun issue something
that, in my understanding, touches the ambiguous condition of being
recognized without necessarily understood. In the end of the 50s,
the field of art in Curitiba is divided in three poetic forces: in first
place, a still naturalist figuration, called academic; coming in second,
a modernist figuration, turned to the deconstruction of correct
drawing; and, finally, an emergent abstraction of an informal edge,
practiced in general by very young artists. Facing this scenery, Bakun
keeps having trouble fitting in and follows a trajectory basically
isolated and personal. In general terms, his intentions make him
close to figurative modernists such as Paul Garfunkel, Alcy Xavier
or Guido Viaro. In poetic terms, however, his keenness for nature,
in one side, and the dispersion of the feature, in the other, make
Bakun a fundamentally contradictory figure. A figure whose works,
in the context of Curitiba, are close to all but are not mistaken by
anything. Its curious, therefore, that an abstract treatment of the ARTUR FREITAS is a History of Art researcher. He acquired his phD and
plane and forms come justly from a heartened approximation towards masters degree in History from the Universidade Federal do Paran
nature. The contradiction is clear: the ostensible patterns of paintings (PGHIS/UFPR), and undergraduated in Arts in the same institution
like Na Clareira end up getting close to informal abstraction; that (DEARTES/UFPR). He is also a professor in the Faculdade de Artes do
same abstraction that, already in 1957, began to gain institutional Paran in Universidade Estadual do Paran (FAP/UNESPAR) and in the
spaces and soon dominated the events in Paran in 1961 and 62, Post-graduation (masters and doctorates) program in History in the
punctuating the crisis of the Bakunian figuration. But a crisis not same university he majored in the subject. Additionally, hes leader
of, lets say, poetry, but of poetic understanding. In short, in the of the research group NAVIS - Ncleo de Artes Visuais (CNPq) and
Curitiba of the 60s, Bakun is already dead, even before he dies. the author of Arte de guerrilha (Edusp, in press), Solar da gravura
(Medusa, 2011) and Tony Camargo (Berlendis & Vertecchia, 2011).
ANTONIO VARGAS, Scenery, unfoldings and contemporary perspectives, Maria Amlia Bulhes and Maria Lcia Bastos Kern, editors 155
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Tradition X Modernity, the author presents relation and unfolding
lines like the european scientificist interest and its repercussion
about the records of the exuberant nature of the new earth. He
also emphasizes the romantic influence that finds in these distant
realms the inspiration for not only exploring the scenery but also
other themes dear to motion, like the exotic and the primitive. In
SCENERY, UNFOLDINGS AND CONTEMPORARY PERSPECTIVES, MARIA the end, the author brings up the latin-american relations between
AMELIA BULHES AND MARIA LCIA BASTOS KERN, EDITORS scenery and identity on analyzing the transformations produced
Antonio Vargas in this artistic concept by the machine, the industry, the natives
influences and, last but not least, social concerns. Alexandra Kennedy-
Translated by Ana Carolina Azevedo Troya, on her turn, presents an essay in which, focusing on the years
between 1850 and 1920 in Ecuador, she attempts to showcase
Paisagem: desdobramentos e perspectivas contemporneas, or the relations between fiction and foundationing visualities and the
Scenery, unfoldings and contemporary perspectives (Editora da idea of territory, being this one related to the knowledge of local
UFRGS, 2010, pp.303), by many researchers, organized by Maria geography and agriculture. Nationalism, estate, politics, literature
Amelia Bulhes and Maria Lcia Bastos Kern, offers us a set of and visual arts are shown as contaminated by the territory and
reflexions on the relations between historical concepts of scenery its topography in an essay that helps the understanding of what
and artistic productions. is usually called latin-american identity. Claudia Vallado de Mattos
In the first part, which deals with Conceptual Unfoldings reminds the reader of the inappropriateness which is to suppose the
(Desdobramentos Conceituais), Javier Maderuelo shows us that environmental critics to be a contemporary phenomena. The author
the idea of scenery as we know it is a modern phenomena once proves such an affirmation on expliciting the relations between the
comparatives are not found in earlier times, and when they are, the knowledge of XIX century's relevant artists, politics and intellectuals
word for them lacks a whole meaning. Thus scenery is understood and the debates and critics about the environmental damage that
much more as a contemplative look from he who looks than as the progress was causing to the local lush. Notice the important Taunay
territory. The scenery as a cultural concept subjected to singularities and Arajo Porto-Alegre.
of each time already evidenced even if precariously in In the third part, Scenery Poetics (Poeticas da Paisagem), Maria
the old Roman empire, but was delayed in almost a millennium Lcia Bastos Kern approaches the scenery in Uruguayan artist
because of Christianity. From its background revival at Renaissance Torres-Garcia's work as a lieux de memoire, and in the work of
until the Baroque times, the concept little developed itself up to Argentinian artist Xul-Solar as imaginary and mystic. With eloquence
Romanticism and the formulation of a new philosophical/aesthetical in writing, the author interestingly presents the power of Catalan
category: the sublime. But, as the author recollects, Romanticism nationalism in the scenery-wise conception of Torres Garcia. In a
brings about the concept of Pitoresque and bucolic scenery, which, concrete and instructional way, the influence of Mediterranean ways
far from being scary, presents itself as welcoming. In the end, the and Eugenio DOrs cultural program are exposed as adopted by the
author approaches the brief modernist negation of scenery by the Uruguayan artist, such as the religious influence and detachment
romance with machines and the city until its plain recuperation by of the St. Lucas Artistic Circle in its vanguardist conception. Such
Land-art and Earth-works in order to remember us that cultivation, exposition offers the reader a historical and geographical immersion
cult and culture all bear a common origin from which we withdraw detailed where artistic analysis are also present. Vinicius Oliveira
the energies that feed our sight so as to transform nature in scenery. Godoy, on his turn, seeks to demonstrate the recurring appearance of
In the second part, The scenery seen through a historical perspective scenery in artist Iber Camargo's drawings and the limitations of its
(A paisagem em perspectiva histrica), Rodrigo Gutirrez presents representative possibilities in which scenery and memory are joined
some unique qualities of the relation between scenery painting and in the construction of the artistic modernity of one of the greatest
the latin-american history and culture in the XIX and XX centuries as Brazilian painters. Gloria Ferreira, on her turn, analyses the works
a consequence of the transformations occurred in european territories. of North-American sculptor Walter De Maria, emphasizing the linkage
156 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
made by the artist between scenery themes and the perception of permeated by experiences, actions and experimentations established
ENGLISH
an invisible and spiritual reality. For this end, De Maria elaborated in determined territories or places. In these experiences, processes
an idea of piece of art that is able to conduct the spectator to and projects, independent and codependent, define themselves in
a level of experience that possibilitates the remembrance of the the track of a practice, of a register not only of space but also
power of the motions that run through nature as the author of the producing existence of archives whose experimentation
affirms. Maria Anglica Melendi, on her turn, builds up a text with generates images that amplifies and resizes historiographic concepts
a refreshing approach, talking of gardens as non-painted sceneries, for scenery. In the last essay of the whole, Maria Amelia Bulhes,
introducing the reader to the Bosco Sacro idealized by Prince Pier- in differentiating the simple displacement of the act of travellng,
Francesco Orsini (1213-84), whose comprehension demands from the threads a reflection on the widening of the concept of scenery by
visitor at least some knowledge on Dante's, Petrarca's and Ariosto's contemporary means of visual apprehension of micro and macroscopic
poetry. Monet's garden is also mentioned along the relation between territories appeased by experiences and propositions of contemporary
gardening and painting, right before the end of this journey of an art. As the author seeks to emphasize, these artistic experiences, in a
essay, which mentions Little Sparta, the poem/garden created amidst numeric image that hides from the straight relation with geographic
the swamp by Scottish poet Ian Hamilton Finlay. territories, are open to transformations in themselves by the hands
The fourth and last part, Digital Poetics and Scenery Questions, of the visitor. Also evidenced are the new possibilities to relate the
offers the reader a rich introduction that allows the understanding scenery appeased by contemporary art through immersive proposes
how contemporary artistic productions developed and designed for and diving into the image that alters the relation of the spectator
digital places widen up even more the concept of scenery. Iliana with the ambient, exemplified through the works of artists such as
Hernndez Garca investigates the heuristic of virtual spaces, saying Nelson Max, Jean Boissier, Gilberto Prado, Stephan Barron, Andr
that artificial life, contrariwise to earthly life, presents itself as a Parente, Michael Aschauer, Joseph Lefvre & Martina Koutnoyan,
system open to questions and never to representations of already Adriaan Stellinwerff and Lozzano Hemmer.
received answers. To this end, the author talks about projects such Thus, Scenery, unfoldings and contemporary perspectives, by its
as Sommerer and Mignonneau's, which show a system of organic variety of approaches, offers itself to the reader as an elegant
abstract shapes modified by the actions of human beings towards prism which allows not only a historical comprehension of one of
the computer system; Rejane Cantoni's and Daniela Kutschat's the most important themes and concepts in western art, but also
project, called OP_ERA, in which the body takes part in changes its survival and transformation nowadays. From the different looks
that succeed in space from a system of interface tracing; and works exposed there, a conviction stays that the relevance of spiritual,
of other artists such as Maurice Benayoun, Jeffrey Shaw and Marcos social and cultural significance of scenery, just as its present, is given
Novak. Claudia Paim and Ulises Ferretti approach scenery from the by the symbolic power of allowing the men to feel like a part of
field of sound experimentations of its futurist origins, mentioning the world and thus, less estranged and solitary. In the end, it is
John Cage, Westerkamp & Andra McCartney and Pierre Schaeffer, and important to remember that the book also brings with it an Image
finally emphasizing the piece Duplo Coro, their own work, originally Archive of colored pictures which help the neophytes to understand.
conceived for Porto Alegres water department garden.
Andr Parente, on his turn, conceptually discusses the scenery
from space to ciberspace, analyzing the relations between time
(or rapidness) and topologies, emphasizing that time, by being
constituted with space, on being altered in topologies, amplifies the
possibilities of experiences and knowledge through heterotopies. To
illustrate that, the author analyzes his own projects and those of
other artists, such as Jean-Luc Boissier, Matt Mullican and Monika ANTONIO VARGAS: Antonio Vargas has a doctorate degree in Painting
Fleishmann. Sandra Rey, on her turn, approaches her own project, by the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, finished in 1992. He
DesDOBRAmentos da paisagem: um processo artstico com base na also has a post-doctorate degree in the Universitat de Barcelona
fotografia digital (Scenery UnFOLDings: an artistic process based on from 1996 and is a professor in the Centre of Arts at UDESC and
digital photography), in which the concept of displacement finds itself at PPGAV-UDESC. Visual artist with exhibitions in Brasil and abroad.
LIANE CHIRON, Mutation intime de la peinture dans la vido numrique 157
COULEUR-CICATRICE
FRANAIS
Je nai pas appris la peinture lcole des beaux-arts. Malevitch
non plus, ni Picasso. Czanne choua au concours dentre. Autre
poque? Sans doute, mais enfin. Picasso apprit toutes les techniques
de lart (tekhn) avec son pre, directeur de lcole des Arts et
Mtiers de la Corogne en Espagne; Malevitch prfra comme tous
MUTATION INTIME DE LA PEINTURE DANS LA VIDO NUMRIQUE les jeunes artistes de lpoque en Russie, tudier dans une cole
liane Chiron dArts appliqus. On sait quil inventa son Carr noir pour la pice
de thtre Victoire sur le soleil, dans leffervescence dchanges un
RESUM: Depuis que je ralise des vidos numriques, suis-je encore t au bord de la mer Baltique, entre thtre, posie, musique et
peintre? La vido fait chaque fois revenir la peinture. Elle est peinture. Lui seul fut capable du transfert prophtique du rideau
hante par des phrases: Les couleurs font brler mon cerveau de scne en tableau, quil nomma suprmatiste, et rvolutionna
(Malevitch) et se voient comme une cicatrice sur un visage la peinture. Dans mon cerveau des phrases sont marques au fer
(Cennino Cennini). rouge: Les couleurs sont pleines dexigence, elles font brler mon
Dans une vido personnelle intitule Les Nageuses (2011), comment cerveau (Malevitch); je ne cherche pas, je trouve (Picasso); et
ont mut la chair et le sang (de lartiste), matires de lart de celle-ci de Braque, moins connue: ce qui ma toujours sauv,
peindre avec tout ce qui choit du corps? Comment tout ce qui dans cest que je nai jamais su ce que je voulais, ou bien: Il faut
les tnbres telluriques, au fond des ocans, se mtamorphose, magma que la toile efface lide, ou encore: la ralit, ce nest pas cela,
visqueux qui dferle en plis et fractures gigantesques, sengouffre cest vers cela2. Autant dire que le langage a toujours t pour
et jaillit chaque seconde, saccorde-t-il avec la dfinition de la moi, comme pour les alchimistes autrefois, la voie daccs la
peinture comme tache qui ressort sur le vivant (W. Benjamin)? peinture en tant que pratique, ce concept de pratique signifiant
Comment la description de la piscine par Merleau-Ponty, modle trs exactement le passage travers une matire. Quelle matire?
selon lui de la qute des peintres, sincarne-t-elle dans cette vido? Cennino Cennini nous en donne lide, au dbut du Livre de lart,
Comment lintime en art, apparu selon Daniel Arasse dans le tableau dans le rcit de sa rencontre avec la couleur. Ce fut, au terme
de la Renaissance, a-t-il mut dans Les Nageuses? Les rfrences dun long voyage avec son pre, dans une montagne loigne, sur
historiques seront ncessaires pour comprendre que peindre en le sol dune grotte o des veines de couleur, et notamment du
tant contemporain suppose un contact intime avec la matire blanc, se voyaient comme une cicatrice sur un visage3. Scne
picturale, fut-elle produite par un code, sans craindre de sy perdre. que jouera Louise Bourgeois, dans ses ttes en tapisserie coutures
Car les codes du numrique sont issus des lois cosmiques et du comme Le Golem, affirmant (et on la croit) quelle a choisi lart
cerveau humain. plutt que la vie. Dans ces ttes-autoportraits, nul nen doute, les
Nos muqueuses, organes, chromosomes, battements de cur, viscres? coutures-cicatrices sont elle, signes de lart en elle. Les gestes y
Ce avec quoi en dfinitive on peint, en utilisant toutes les techniques rappellent latelier familial de restauration de tapisseries, mais elle
dun champ largi de la peinture, seule fin que se dploie lintime y rejoue sa rencontre avec la couleur, lave dans la rivire au bout
mutabilit de la couleur. du jardin Choisy et dans la Creuse. Connue comme sculpteur,
est-elle peintre encore, dans ces ttes?
MOTS-CLS: Contemporain, couleur-cicatrice, intime, lois cosmiques,
mutabilit, piscine, tache, vido numrique.
2
Depuis que je ne peins plus avec une brosse ou un pinceau, que LA MARQUE ET LA TACHE, PARADIGMES DE LA PEINTURE
FRANAIS
les ailes portent parfois des ocelles - trange aboutissement du lui-mme et les couleurs-matires des Nageuses.
FRANAIS
processus chromatique -, la couleur est toujours l. Loge dans les Parce quelle ressort, et spcialement dans la peinture, la couleur
entrailles, love dans la chysalide, elle doit rompre une carapace fait oublier le sans- fond primordial do elle vient: labme, par
pour apparatre, phmre et fragile, sur les ailes intouchables du dfinition sans fond. Le rouge au dbut des Nageuses y est semblable
papillon. Ainsi, pigment qui nadhre pas la membrane rticule au dernier coup de pinceau pour Frenhofer: au peintre, on ne sait
de laile, donc pure superficie se dtachant de son support lorsquon aucun gr des dessous, qui affleurent en surface, comme dans la
y touche et que la teinte colle aux doigts, la couleur est le lieu gorge des noys Si, comme le disait Roger de Piles, la couleur
des mtamorphoses et des transmutations. Le filtre do scoule est un fard, ce ne peut tre selon lexpression: piquer un fard, elle
(colare) un temps rversible. Au sein de la couleur saccomplit le est le pharmakon dont on maquille les cadavres, donnant lillusion
chiasme entre la surface (les ailes) et la profondeur (les ufs). La de la vie. Elle doit pourtant donner limpression davoir germ
rversibilit de la surface et de la profondeur sopre aussi dans sur le support, dtre une zgraphia, une peinture du vivant. Klee
le battement des ailes du papillon, lintermittence du cillement des multiplie dans ses tableaux les couches de fonds, et les couleurs
ailes, o vacille la couleur. Dans cette faille o elle se fait et se de Poussin semblent merger des tnbres pour y retourner. La
dfait, a lieu lessence du regard, trait vanouissant et punctiforme, naissance de la vie mme la mort, cest peut-tre aussi le scandale
insaisissable couleur des choses, qui les peint de reflets changeants. dOlympia: la couleur cadavrique du corps de Victorine Meurent,
Les choses nous regardent au gr des reflets qui les touchent, et qui dit la possible putrfaction de la chair, lorigine dgotante
mme sur lacier, par la grce dun simple souffle dposant sa bue, des couleurs, la mort sur le vivant, et qui, dcapite par le ruban
dferle, fugitive, une vague de couleurs. Quil y ait cette fugacit dans autour du cou, nous regarde droit dans les yeux. Les couleurs des
les Nageuses tait mon obsession. Il fallait sans relche rduire, Nageuses, mergeant des tnbres, nous regardent de leurs frfonds.
rduire, comme le voulait Duchamp, en somme, faire une vido Cette couleur -matire, les anciens le savaient, qui la mettaient
vite, qui ait la rapidit des spots tlvisuels daujourdhui. sur larchitecture, dans un geste archaque dfiant la mesure et
Pour Benjamin, la peinture na pas darrire-fond, ce qui la spcifie les calculs savants, tait linassimilable, lirruption du tellurique au
est dtre une tache dtache dun fond. Ce fond, dont elle est fronton des temples, de lanimalit dans luvre de lesprit. Rupture
issue, est le dluge; le flottement de la peinture au-devant de son qui nous met face ltre sauvage, ce tissu commun dont nous
support procure lillusion de juste merger du dluge. Lorsque la sommes faits, qui se tient devant nous dans le monde vertical. Pour
peinture adopte des couleurs de terre, par exemple dans les Tables Benjamin, la peinture est verticale, elle est ce qui du monde se lve
de Dubuffet ou les tableaux dEugne Leroy, sans doute fait-elle et regarde la lumire. Elle veut oublier son origine tellurique, que
retour lorigine tellurique des couleurs, cette dimensionnalit o le dessin, demeur horizontal, plus prs du gouffre, lui rappelle. La
a lieu la dflagration de ltre retournant au gouffre que lartiste, piscine est-elle ce gouffre?
ressent plus que tout autre. Profondeur dont le plongeur doit
revenir, dit Valry. Profondeur que Dubuffet constelle avec des ailes FILMER LA PISCINE. RAYONNEMENT DU VISIBLE
de papillons. Puisque lartiste nest pas un papillon aux clatantes
couleurs, o doit-il aller chercher sa couleur, depuis toujours? Lacan la vole, depuis la fentre de ma chambre d htel Manama,
nous le souffle9: dans le dchet, la viscosit des matires dsintgres, capitale du Bahren, o je suis, trangre de passage, pour une
broyes, dissoutes et oxydes, digres, putrfies dans leau, cuites exposition personnelle en mars 2008, je filme en plonge deux
par la chaleur, le feu ou le soleil. Dans la boue et les viscres. Cest nageuses dans la piscine. On sait quune uvre doit retracer la
l o ds les commencements, la couleur se fait. Ce sont la couleur totalit de lhistoire du sujet quelle traite (ici la piscine et deux
native de Duchamp, couleur du chocolat que le clibataire broie nageuses). Bassin pour les rites purificatoires chrtiens, dont le
poisson (piscis) est lemblme, la piscine est dans la liturgie, une
9
petite cuve destine recevoir leau qui a servi aux baptmes, la
LACAN, J. Le sminaire. Livre XI. Les quatre concepts fondamentaux de la
psychanalyse (1964), paris, Seuil, 1973, p. 107.
purification des objets sacrs10. Grand bassin de natation depuis le
10 11
XVI sicle, devenue aujourdhui signe dlvation sociale, la piscine capture lindiffrenciation mathmatique de leau et des nageuses,
FRANAIS
est aussi le bassin de dsactivation dun racteur dans une centrale que je vois prisonnires de lcran, tournant sans fin dans cet espace
nuclaire. Cette constellation des sens du mot piscine, ses mutations confin. Leau nest pas dans la piscine, ni sur lcran, mais dans
du religieux au social et au scientifique, du nuclaire o la piscine lintimit cosmique de lunivers auquel le numrique donne accs.
dsactive et purifie lnergie atomique de son possible danger de Quand ma camra suit les nageuses afin quelles ne sortent pas de
mort, franchit dun mot lhistoire des substances et installe une leau cranique, je pense aux meurtres dans les piscines au cinma:
connivence entre le sacr, latome et le pixel. Selon Merleau-Ponty, Les Diaboliques (1955), La Piscine (1968), la srie des James Bond
leau elle-mme, la puissance aqueuse, llment sirupeux et (1962-2008), aux noys du Titanic (1997), et surtout ceux qui
miroitant, je ne peux pas dire quelle soit dans lespace: elle nest tentent de nager et se sauver dans la fresque du Dluge du clotre
pas ailleurs, mais elle nest pas dans la piscine. Elle lhabite, elle de lglise Santa Maria Novella Florence12. Fresque abme dans
sy matrialise, elle ny est pas contenue, et si je lve les yeux vers ce clotre ouvert sur un petit jardin, que je suis alle voir, gorge
lcran des cyprs o joue le rseau des reflets, je ne puis contester noue: pour moi le vrai dluge est l, cest en peinture quil existe,
que leau le visite aussi, ou du moins y envoie son essence active dans cette fresque plie en partie efface ouverte tous les vents
et vivante. Cest cette animation interne, ce rayonnement du visible depuis prs de cinq sicles. Dans le lignage de ces films, de cette
que le peintre cherche sous les noms de profondeur, despace, de fresque, la camra capture la jointure du milieu et du vivant o se
couleur11. Cette animation interne, ce rayonnement du visible joue le drame de lexistence. Chez ltre humain, remarque Dagognet,
retentissement, dans lesprit, de tous les sens du mot piscine. Ainsi philosophe et mdecin, le dedans de lex-dehors permet le dehors
dans Villa Amalia (2009) lhrone, liane, compositrice de musique, de lancien dedans13. En effet ltre humain nest plus protg par
touffe dans sa propre vie. Elle porte dans une piscine urbaine les os ou leurs quivalents protecteurs qui enveloppaient le corps
des lunettes de plonge qui la font ressembler un poisson forc lorigine du vivant. Je suis rsolument du ct de cette fragilit.
de sortir de leau pour respirer. Elle trouve enfin sa respiration Cest elle que je veux magnifier, comme dans la fresque du Dluge,
cratrice dans une villa sur une le, face la Mditerrane. La mer pour qumerge une prcarit partage depuis cette poque. Il faudra
enfin trouve baigne la totalit de lcran de cinma, qui devient saisir ltat naissant, ainsi que sest forme lle o je suis, le
cette eau salvatrice, purificatrice, mais cadre, dsactivant la menace dcalage entre la ralit concrte et sa puissance de transfiguration.
dtouffement. Ce sera la tche des calculs de lordinateur, des couches de couleur,
Jai film leur insu deux nageuses, lune en maillot noir jusquaux qui altreront profondment la dfinition des images, les faisant
genoux (qui en sortant revtira la abaya), lautre en deux-pices reculer de lointaines poques o on ne comptait pas les pixels
fleurs. Leau devait tre tout entire contenue dans lcran de par millions. Les faisant, simultanment, devenir peinture: milieu
contrle, qui a remplac la fentre du tableau dAlberti, les nageuses chromosomique en miroir de nos corps, tache en mouvement, marque
demeurant dans cette eau cranique, virtuelle, modle rduit de toute qui ressort sur du vivant.
leau dans laquelle on puisse se baigner. Comme si je filmais deux La capture numrique, si bien nomme, exile les nageuses des yeux de
spcimens de nageuses immerges dans un liquide de laboratoire lesprit comme de ceux du corps, en soumettant leur apparence la
dont je modifierai plus tard la substance par la couleur, laide force inhrente la distance14. En tant que donnes mathmatiques,
de lordinateur, selon le protocole dune rigoureuse exprimentation, elles sont traduites en schmas identiques aux structures mentales
qui donnerait toute sa chance la surface en faisant affleurer sa humaines. Les nageuses et leau mutent en symboles issus de lois
profondeur dans ses reflets. Le point de vue loign fait reculer la cosmiques universelles; elles ont leur point de rfrence hors de la
scne dans le temps. Ds que je les filme, les deux nageuses sont plante, chappant la gomtrie, mesure de la terre. Leur point
sur le disque dur de la camra et dans le pass qui recule jusqu
la faille qui forma le Golfe Persique o sengouffrrent les eaux
sales. Lappareil transfigure la scne en systme binaire (0,1). Il 13
12 14
Paolo Ucello, Les scnes de la vie de No: Le Dluge et le Retrait des eaux, XVe ARENDT, H.. Condition de lhomme moderne (1961), trad. G. Fradier, prf. P.
sicle, 206 x 170 cm, Chiostro Verde, Santa Maria Novella, Florence. Ricur, Paris, Calmann-Lvy, 1994, p. 335-338.
LIANE CHIRON, Mutation intime de la peinture dans la vido numrique 161
de vue nest pas le mien, en contre-plonge, gographique et priv tnbres telluriques et du feu magmatique?
FRANAIS
(point de vue dtrangre), mais celui de lastrophysique universelle. Blanchot rcusait lintimit ferme, ce mauvais intrieur qui
Ce point hors-champ, je le vois dans limage filme, quand chaque nous exclut de laccs vritable aux choses. Il demande datteindre
nageuse soulve au plus haut la tte hors de leau comme pour ce point que Barthes nommera le punctum et dsignera comme
viter de se noyer. Ce moment est pour moi le punctum, ce qui me blessure intime, charnelle, qui est dans luvre et cependant hors-
touche. Leur prison est leau, est la terre, cest la mienne, cest la champ. La couleur en est la cicatrice, elle se peint sur le visage
vtre. Mon premier souvenir, enfant, est la terre o sont poss mes des regardeurs, grce aux neurones miroirs, dcouverts en 1996 par
pieds, au loin la mer traverser pour aller au ciel, l-haut. Moi si le neurologue Rizzolatti. Dans lintervalle de ce transfert, a lieu ce
petite. La camra numrique mapporte enfin le point de vue du point dorigine de luvre: la fois intimit et dehors; une intimit
ciel, fait prouver la mme loi de gravitation de Newton pour les qui, en nous, serait la ralit du dehors, telle que nous y serions en
corps terrestres et clestes. Ce nest pas le ciel de mon enfance, mais nous au-dehors dans lintimit et lampleur intime de ce dehors18.
un ciel simul. Mathmatique. La peinture est devenue cosmique. Dans la vido, je veux quelles nagent lintrieur de leur propre
corps et lextrieur delles-mmes, dans cette intime rversibilit
MUTATIONS DE LINTIME EN PEINTURE du vivant (Dagognet). Elles sy dplacent comme dans lunivers o
lon ne rencontre que soi-mme, o lon ne voit rien dautre que
Lintime a t conu et pens dans la peinture au XV sicle, ce qui se ramne des schmas que ltre humain porte en lui.
la Renaissance, avec linstauration du tableau moderne, dfini par linverse de la science, il ny a pas de progrs en art; aux symboles
Alberti comme fentre ouverte sur le monde. Donnant cela la mathmatiques se superposent les mythes, autres constructions de
plus grand extension, G. Wajcman envisage que le tableau moderne lesprit. Les Nageuses se dplacent tout dabord dans un bain rouge
aura, dun mme geste, instaur lide cartsienne que lhomme a vif, dans leur propre sang, donnant limpression de faire natre, de
dsormais droit de regard sur le monde, avec Dieu, et dfini lintime leurs mouvements, la couleur, transfusant le rouge vivant la sortie
comme ce lieu dans le monde o lhomme peut se tenir spar de sa prison de veines et de chair. Le processus gnrique est aussi
du monde, do, par la fentre, en secret, il peut le contempler, et la permanence, reste plus vive chez lartiste, dune mmoire ftale.
o, hors de tout regard, il peut se regarder lui-mme15. cette Dans un mythe dogon, on dit que durant les derniers mois, le ftus
poque la peinture devient un art libral par lintroduction des nage dans le ventre de sa mre19. Les Nageuses sont-elles en train
mathmatiques, grce lusage de la perspective. Par la fentre de se donner la vie, dans leur propre sang quon dit impur pour
albertienne qui permet une vue, le monde est reprsent selon les femmes, comme lartiste qui nat de son uvre? Au cours du
les lois de la perspective lgitime, issue de la gomtrie, par travail, la vido inverse la fonction de purification des piscines dans
dfinition mesure de la terre. Afin dexplorer linvention de lintime les centrales nuclaires, o seffectue la dsactivation des impurets,
dans le tableau de la Renaissance, Daniel Arasse rappelle cette ide do le son, mtallique et sourd, pourrait provenir. La lenteur et
de Brunelleschi: Tout peintre se peint16. Savonarole prcise: en le son transmutent les Nageuses en corps-machines, les immergent
tant que peintre, selon son concept. Formule en vogue Florence dans dpais liquides: sang, nappes de ptrole, abysses pourpres, lave
autour de 1500. Comment lintime de la peinture a-t-il mut avec en fusion qui consume la nageuse, dans lavant-dernire squence.
lusage de lordinateur, dans un monde non plus reprsent mais Alors Les Nageuses entrent dans lintimit dune mort partage,
simul par le numrique? O lcran de contrle de la camra a archtypale, qui rsonne dans lespce entire20.
remplac la fentre dAlberti? Selon quel procs la vido numrique,
Les Nageuses17 (2010-2011), rend-elle leur puissance contemporaine, 17
infiltre par la science, les couleurs de la chair et du sang, des Les Nageuses, vidos numriques, 650, 2010 et 221, 2011.
18
15
BLANCHOT, M. LEspace littraire, Paris, Gallimard, coll. Folio Essais, 1955, p. 173.
http://www.lacan.com/symptom8_articles/wajcman8.html. Consult le 19-10-2011.
19
16 DURAND, G. Les Structures anthropologiques de limaginaire, Paris, Dunod,
ARASSE, D. Le sujet dans le tableau, Paris, Flammarion, 2010, p. 11. 1969, p. 247.
162 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Sang, ptrole, lave, reconnaissables leurs couleurs, ne sont pas tnbres contemporaines, sous laspect de leur menace que nos corps
FRANAIS
reprsents mais simuls. Du traitement numrique advient une abritent. Elles transfusent entre eux, la vitesse de la lumire de
sombre histologie du corps, fusion du code digital et du code leurs pixels, non pas les souvenirs privs de lenfance, ni les scnes
gntique, issue des grandes fosses abyssales o naquit la vie. Par publiques de lhistoire, mais ce que Rilke nomme lintimit du
les pixels visibles de prs dans les dernires secondes (Nageuses cur: intimit dune anamnse magmatique, de la nuit cosmique
2011), Les Nageuses sont fabriques, drives, comme Pandora. Ainsi et de la profondeur ocanique commune tous les arts. Cette
les riches toffes numriques dont celle-ci aurait pu tre vtue profondeur nest pas dans la piscine, mais dans les couleurs de la
simulent le retournement de nos tissus et liquides physiologiques vido et leur transsubstantiation en nous. Dans nos chromosomes et
dans le chatoiement de la substance profonde de la nuit cosmique. notre ADN qui nous est mondialement commun 99 %.
Exposes dans un espace dart du marais Paris21, Les Nageuses Seul lart, qui procure la chair et au sang lindiffrenciation des
font apparatre, plus intensment dans la nuit dissoute que sont genres et des poques, slve comme le voulait Mallarm la
les couleurs dans le rgime nocturne des images, entrelaces avec puissance du ciel toil qui contient, virtuellement, la multiplicit
la rue, la ville, son histoire sanglante sous lAncien rgime et la des galaxies de plus en plus anciennes que les tlescopes de plus
rvolution, le fleuve qui a charri des corps dalgriens le 17 octobre en plus gants permettent dapprocher, lexception de la matire
1961 je men souviens , ce que Merleau-Ponty nomme la noire indtectable par lastrophysique. Composant 95 % de lunivers,
chair du monde. Nocturne, ocanique, cosmique, antdiluvienne, elle elle peut seulement tre simule numriquement. Avec le numrique,
scintille aux origines de la vie confondue avec lart. qui en simule les couleurs, mme la chair et le sang sextraient
La vido numrique accomplirait la scintillation de notre altrit des lois cosmiques excdant le systme solaire. Distinctes des lois
ddiffrencie, o la potique retrouve le chemin du sang dune plantaires et naturelles, elles transfigurent durablement douleur et
ligne artistique, dune gnalogie mythique et dune chair cosmique. prcarit en les donnant voir dans le rythme vivant du coloris.
En sincarnant dans dautres corps, lartiste descend dans le paysage Numrique ou pas, lart uvrerait avec cette matire noire, ou
liquide comme le sang dans les veines, incorpore ce paysage virtuel masse manquante de lunivers, riche de toutes les teintes celes
o son corps ne trouve pas sa place, empourpre le ciel qui fuit / dans lobscur, incalculable. Cette matire noire, comme les noirs de
travers un carr de glace22 qua regard Reading, avec passion, Malevitch ou de Matisse, est la couleur du cach de la chair. Cest
le condamn mort clbr par Oscar Wilde dans la Ballade de la elle qui permet lincarnation dmontre par les neurosciences: dans
gele de Reading. Mais dans Les Nageuses, notre poque o pour notre cerveau, des neurones miroirs provoquent en nous, travers
la premire fois ce pourpre est simul par des calculs, le ciel est notre regard, lesquisse du geste ici des nageuses faisant surgir
devenu scientifique. Ce qui nannule pas les pouvoirs prmonitoires en boucle, du noir, ses couleurs, pendant 2 minutes 21secondes.
de lart. Exposes pour la premire fois en 2010, peu avant Alors, si la vido peut tre projete au revers dun trs grand cran,
lruption de lEyjafjll en Islande, la fuite du ptrole dans le Golfe avec un son de machine rsonnant comme dans un formidable
du Mexique, les incendies de Russie et les inondations du Pakistan, chantier tellurique, sorte denfer, lon doit prouver la sensation de
annonant la catastrophe de Fukushima, Les Nageuses, reprises en se tenir au milieu de la couleur en train de se faire dans un bruit
2011, en deviennent la prophtie, donnant voir hors-champ les assourdissant. Dans la couleur comme milieu, en somme, dtache
dun fond, ainsi que Benjamin la dfinie.
20
Que donne voir, comme tout art, cette vido-peinture? La disparition
Ibid., p. 253. des tres et des choses dans lintimit de leur mort, leur incarnation
virtuelle et relle la fois. Cest pourquoi, comme la matire noire
21 que lon nomme aussi masse cache, quand luvre se montre en
Le Dressing, Espace dart FreePStar, 1er-31 mai 2010, nuit et jour. public, cette intimit doit rester masque. En latence derrire le
sensible. Virtuelle. Inapprochable. Sacre. Elle reste cette intimit du
22 cur, au sens o le cur est aussi un organe, et o cet organe est
WILDE, Oscar. De profondis. La Ballade de la gele de Reading (Librairie gnrale ce qui pense23 en premier, activ par une rgion particulire du
franaise, 2000, 1905 et 1962 pour De profondis; 1898 pour La Ballade), prcds
de LArtiste en prison dA. Camus, trad. et prf. L. Lack et J. Besson, Paris, Le cerveau. Lintime en art nexiste quincarn, ne sincarne que dans
Livre de Poche, coll. Classique, 2004, p. 213. le regard dun public. Lart na rien faire avec les souvenirs de
LIANE CHIRON, Mutation intime de la peinture dans la vido numrique 163
la vie prive ni avec les circonstances de la vie sociale, seulement comme dans un miroir. Miroir dont il nest pas tonnant que la
FRANAIS
avec la vie intime de lart, de geste en geste, avec des moyens piscine soit le paradigme dont Merleau-Ponty fournit la description:
renouvels par chaque poque, sans que les moyens traditionnels en Quand je vois travers lpaisseur de leau le carrelage au fond
deviennent obsoltes, puisquil ny a pas de progrs en art. Il faut de la piscine, je ne le vois pas malgr leau, les reflets, je le vois
cependant, de quelque faon et sans relche, revenir aux origines, justement travers eux, par eux. [] Si je voyais sans cette chair
ce quon nomme, dans les mythes, avant le dluge, que provoque la gomtrie du carrelage, cest alors que je cesserais de le voir
lartiste et qui sy plonge. Victime et bourreau. comme il est, o il est, savoir: plus loin que tout lieu identique28.
Dans la vie relle [dit Louise Bourgeois], je midentifie la victime, Hockney dit encore propos dune autre de ses piscines: Gregory
cest pour a que je me suis tourne vers lart. Dans mon art, nageant. Los Angeles, 1e mars 198229, quil limagine comme tant
je suis lassassin. Je sympathise avec le sort du meurtrier24. Les [sa] version des plafonds de Tiepolo [] vous savez, ces votes
Nageuses, cest avec des couleurs picturales que je les assassine, baroques recouvertes de petits anges dodus qui montent trs haut
calcinant lune delles dans la lave brlante. La piscine cranique dans le ciel si bleu30.
est-elle le tableau parfait, comme on le dit de celles de David
Hockney? Dans Portrait dun artiste (Piscine avec deux figures) * * *
de 197225 le personnage dans la piscine devient une allgorie
de la figure peinte, et la piscine, le symbole de lart26. Certes, INTIME MUTABILIT DE LA MATIRE PICTURALE
mais nous pouvons voir dans ce tableau de Hockney une scne
de meurtre, o le nageur est un noy dont lassassin debout au Dans Linhumain, Lyotard, qui savait regarder la peinture, crivait:
bord de la piscine, en veste rouge, vrifie du regard quil ne bouge Le peintre est saisi ou dessaisi par une teinte31. Il prenait pour
plus. Lartiste se serait ddoubl en deux figures. Il faut, dit-il, se exemple Czanne, qui devant la montagne [], voulaitque ce
ressentir soi-mme et peindre: sortir de soi en quelque sorte et se dessaisissement, le regardeur puisse son tour lprouver []
placer dans la peinture. [] jai toujours t obsd par le fait devant la couleur pose et compose en tableau. Et quand je dis
de voir [] Lart visuel doit traiter du fait de voir parce que la couleur [ajoutait Lyotard], cela sentend de toute matire picturale.
premire chose que vous demande lart visuel est de regarder27. linverse de Czanne devant la montagne, cest au cinma et le
Regarder le crime parfait? la fin du XV sicle, pour Marcile Ficin, plus souvent par la tlvision, quruptions volcaniques et tsunamis,
fils de mdecin, les uvres dart qui se rapportent la vue et catastrophes en tous genres, ont pntr, en images provoques
loue proclament lesprit de lartiste, cest--dire la disposition par les neurones-miroirs, au plus intime de ce qui se voit en
et limage de son esprit, car lesprit sexprime et se reflte moi (Merleau-Ponty). Jai voulu redonner ces images-miroirs,
immatrielles et lumineuses, bien relles pour moi, leur intime
27
23
Ibid., p. 196.
CASSIRER, E. Langage et mythe. propos des noms de dieux (1924), trad. O.
Hanse-Love, Paris, Minuit, 1973, p. 63-64.
28
Gregory nageant. Los Angeles, 1e mars 1982, polarod composite, 70,5 x 130,2
25 cm, coll. D. Hockney
David Hockney, Portrait dun artiste (Piscine avec deux figures),1972, acrilyque
sur tole, 214 x 305 cm, coll. particulire. 30
matrialit picturale, chromosomique, travers la mutabilit de la exposition de Picasso la Tate Gallery, dira: Il pouvait matriser
FRANAIS
couleur qui la rend propice au dsarmement du regard32, la tous les styles, toutes les techniques. La leon que jen tire, cest
dfaite de lesprit. Conditions dun devenir-muqueuses, organes, que lon doit les utiliser tous36. Faons de revenir, chaque fois,
battements de cur, viscres. Ce avec quoi en dfinitive on peint. aux origines gnriques de lart, un champ largi de la peinture,
Les mutations dune piscine et des nageuses ne sont pas un prtexte vritable corps de lartiste. Faon, comme Louise Bourgeois, de
pour exprimenter lintime mutabilit de la matire numrique. choisir lart plutt que la vie.
Est-ce un hasard si jai film en 2008 au Bahren, ce pays du
Golfe secou trois ans plus tard, comme dautres, par le printemps 26 octobre 2011
arabe? Si jai vu, dans deux nageuses dont les diffrences dorigines
mont frappe, la violence du conflit venir? Conflit sur lequel une
chape de plomb est tombe. Ce que jai vu, ce nest pas le bleu de
la piscine dun htel de luxe pour touristes fortuns, mais sa part
dombre, sa tragdie latente. Comme un appel. De mme Hockney,
qui fut graphiste33, qui a longtemps expriment la couleur avec
la photocopieuse et lordinateur, a fait virer le bleu des piscines
californiennes et du ciel des plafonds baroques en ce rouge sanglant
dont sont peintes ses immenses toiles du Grand Canyon34, plaies
vif des origines ciel ouvert. Sous la trs mince bande de ciel
bleu qui court sur les 744,2 cm de long du Bigger Grand Canyon,
nous voyons sa chair vomie par les bouches ouvertes dun couple
de damns, dans un double cri rectile.
La condition pour tre contemporain? Ne pas se laisser aveugler
par les lumires du sicle et [parvenir] saisir en elles la part de
lombre, leur sombre intimit35. Sen saisir en peinture, par contact
intime avec la matire picturale, fut-elle produite par un code, sans 36
craindre le risque de sy perdre, puisquil faut prcisment disparatre D. Hockney, op. cit, p. 169.
dans la peinture comme le peintre chinois dans le paysage. Devenir
comme la nageuse qui se noie dans les pixels, bouche ouverte, et
renat dans son sang. Entre le monde et moi, choisir le monde,
disait Kafka. Faire merger un monde en peinture, mme avec les
moyens de la vido numrique. Hockney, impressionn par une LIANE CHIRON: est agrge dArts plastiques, Docteur dtat,
Professeur mrite luniversit Paris 1 Panthon-Sorbonne et artiste
32
plasticienne. Paris 1, elle dirige le Centre de Recherche en Arts
Ibid. Visuels (CRAV). Sa recherche, croise avec une pratique artistique,
questionne le procs crateur et les mutations du regard, notamment
33 lre du numrique. Elle publie et expose linternational (Brsil,
Il obtint Bradford le National Diploma of Design, a fait des dcors dopra Chine, Tunisie, Core, etc.). Elle a dirig aux Publications de la
et des affiches. Sorbonne une srie douvrages sur X, luvre en procs: Croisements
dans lart (1996), Croisements des arts (1997), Lincertain dans lart
34
(1998), La main en procs dans les arts plastiques (2000), Lobjet et
A Bigger Grand Canyon, 1998, huile sur 60 toiles, 207 x 744 cm, coll. D. Hockney.
son lieu (2004). Paysages croiss. La part du corps (2008), Migrations
35
/ Mutations. Paysages dans lart contemporain (2010), Lintime,
AGAMBEN, G. Quest ce que le contemporain?, trad. M. Rovere, Paris, Payot et le priv, le public dans lart contemporain (2012). paratre, un
Rivages, coll. Poche, 2008, p. 21. ouvrage personnel: Lnigme du visible.
NSTOR GARCA CANCLINI, Mercosur: la bienal de la desglobalizacin 165
ESPAOL
de desgaste y por su reciente proliferacin mundial (cerca de 200),
el catlogo comienza enunciando lo que esta bienal no es: ni una
enciclopedia donde se ilustran conceptos ni un archivo para exhibir
retricas curatoriales o documentar experiencias que no pudimos
ver ni una feria de tecnologa a la que se va a mirar las sorpresas
que los museos todava no compraron.
MERCOSUR: LA BIENAL DE LA DESGLOBALIZACIN Tambin percibimos que se aleja de las simples oposiciones binarias
Nstor Garca Canclini (centro/periferia, norte/sur) y de la exaltacin posmoderna de un
nomadismo que descuidaba las diferencias y desigualdades. Cul
RESUMEN: Desde la idea de que los procesos de globalizacin es la geopoltica de esta Bienal? Quiere preguntarse de nuevo
aprovecham los movimientos globales para crear la infraestructura por lo que hoy pueden ser experiencias no ingenuas de nacin,
que fortalezca la base local, abandonando el marco imaginario territorio y revolucin.
de las identidades nacionales, el autor analiza la Bienal de Artes Un primer asombro que ofrece la muestra es la abundancia de
Visualesl del Mercosur, 2011. El centra em la propuesta curatorial banderas: acumuladas, desconstruidas, ironizadas, pero cuya insistencia
Geopoticas un cuestionamiento de los conceptos de nacionalidad por s sola desafa el lugar comn de que la globalizacin habra
y centro / periferia. clausurado lo nacional. Francis Alys presenta dos viejos anuncios
de banderas mexicanas con indicacin del lugar donde se venden
PALABRAS CLAVE: Globalizacin, deglobalizacin, Bienal del Mercosur, y la sobre impresin in a given situation: sobre una leemos
geopoticas. representacin, sobre otra idntica espectculo.
Despliegue de propiedades es el ttulo de una de las piezas ms
Por qu debe haber una Bienal del Mercosur si no existe un arte potentes: Leslie Shows colg en lo alto una treintena de banderas
mercosureo? Artistas y crticos de Argentina, Brasil, Paraguay y blancas de las que chorrean colores, insignias y elementos grficos.
Uruguay han cuestionado incluso que se hable de arte nacional en Como estandartes que se derriten y ya no pueden comunicar
estos pases. Suena como discriminacin que en bienales y ferias de identidades compactas. Los fragmentos que pueden leerse dejan
las metrpolis se interpreten las obras de Guillermo Kuitca o Cildo ver restos de banderas de pases y marcas geogrficas o seales
Meireles, ms que por sus contribuciones estticas segn se hace de trnsito: lo nacional, lo geolgico y lo urbano.
con artistas ingleses o alemanes midiendo cmo representan sus Otra pared enorme est cubierta por una bandera negra, titulada
culturas nacionales de origen. Cielo, obra de Luis Romero, que slo recoge soles, lunas y estrellas
Paradojas de este tipo motivaron que en la 8 Bienal del Mercosur, de muchas banderas bordadas en hilo blanco. Ni franjas, ni escudos,
que se desarrolla del 10 de septiembre hasta el 15 de noviembre ni heroicas consignas polticas; slo una constelacin donde lo que
de 2011, su curador, Jos Roca, eligiera como eje conceptual la divide es omitido. Aunque el artista dice que algunos espectadores le
geopotica. Nacida en 1997 para acompaar la integracin econmica pidieron eliminar smbolos que refieren a identificaciones religiosas,
de los cuatro pases citados, la Bienal logr posicionar a Porto Alegre como seal de intolerancia y quizs, al mismo tiempo, deseo de
como foco internacional. Al principio fue discutida por exhibir sobre un imaginario firmamento beatfico donde no haya que hacerse
todo lo que se hace en Brasil, o por la dificultad de representar cargo de las diferencias.
artsticamente ese proceso de integracin regional. Luego de haber Paola Parcerisa exhibe una bandera paraguaya vaciada, en la que
estado en la 5 edicin y seguir su proceso, veo que se abre ahora slo los bordes de cada franja estn marcados por sutiles hilos de
a todos los continentes sin repetir los estereotipos del mainstream color. Quedan los lmites liberados de la contundencia y el emblema
artstico y acadmico. central. Averiguo: cmo fue recibida en Paraguay? La gente comn
la conoci cuando la llev a la Bienal de Venecia. Mi hijo de 14 aos,
cuando estaba hacindola, pregunt: Es para un partido de ftbol?
Cuando la termin y slo vea los bordes, entendi as el sentido
Texto publicado en la Revista del diario Clarn, el 2 de noviembre de 2011. de que cada franja quedara blanca: Se fueron todos.
166 REVISTA PORTO ARTE: PORTO ALEGRE, V. 18, N. 31, NOVEMBRO/2011
Las migraciones y las fronteras han estado en el centro de la no estar incluidos. Pero est la obra de Alberto Lastreto, que vive
ESPAOL
discusin poltica y visual sobre lo que queda de las naciones. Los en Montevideo. S, pero naci en Argentina y ltimamente est
desplazamientos masivos y las represiones fronterizas alimentan, a en Nueva York. Quin est autorizado a representar un pas que
veces, representaciones melodramticas o panfletarias. En el extremo figura entre los que cuentan mayor porcentaje fuera de su territorio?
opuesto, han incitado obras que reducen la interculturalidad al Lo responde su obra, El prcer, una figura a caballo videoanimada
nomadismo, una circulacin fluida de personas y mensajes que que salta ms all del pedestal, sobre parques, arcos de ftbol,
disolvera las diferencias. edificios, con fondos de paisajes de distintos pases, conviviendo con
Algunos artistas combinaron los emblemas nacionales con la otros monumentos, desde el Arco Trajano hasta la Torre de Tatlin.
iconografa transnacional, como hicieron Melanie Smith y Rafael Erase una poca en que los pases se valoraban segn fuesen ms o
Ortega en Estadio Azteca. El video mezcla imgenes patriticas, menos bendecidos por la globalizacin. Haba que abrir la economa
prehispnicas, de un dolo de la lucha libre, del arte contemporneo a inversiones externas y aumentar las exportaciones; la prosperidad
y de la bebida ms famosa, compuestas por centenares de jvenes se meda no por indicadores del bienestar de la poblacin nacional
que alzan tablas como mosaicos sumados: sugieren no slo lo que (alza de salarios y del consumo), sino por su interdependencia
dicen las imgenes sino el disciplinamiento social y su contradictoria con el mundo y por el equilibrio de la balanza comercial. Algunas
o fallida realizacin. Una gran pantalla del estadio, en lo alto de regiones comenzaron a sentir frgil la apertura indiscriminada y
la tribuna, teniendo en los mrgenes los logos de Coca-Cola y la se agruparon para protegerse: la unificacin europea, Mercosur, los
cerveza Corona, declara: The Revolution will not be televised. Como tratados de libre comercio o entre grupos de pases, como el TLC
al mismo tiempo esta obra representa a Mxico en la Bienal de de Amrica del Norte.
Venecia, dice que la tarea de embajador que a veces se encarga al La fragilidad sospechada se convirti en catstrofe. Si bien esta
arte se cumple mejor si asume los smbolos histricos entretejidos globalizacin vena produciendo desde hace dos dcadas desempleo
con la iconografa deportiva, comercial y meditica. y salida de migrantes en el Sur, rechazo a los migrantes y xenofobia
Un mrito de la Bienal del Mercosur es desmarcarse del imaginario en el Norte, cada de las clases medias y peor pobreza en todas
de identidades nacionales soberanas. Entre las intervenciones con partes, el modelo estall en septiembre de 2008. Habamos tenido
ms eco se halla la del colectivo esloveno creador del Estado antes cataclismos nacionales (Mxico en 1994, Rusia y otros pases
NSK, micronacin o Estado en tiempo que abre su consulado en del este europeo al final de esa dcada, Argentina en 2001), pero en
muchas bienales y entrega pasaportes: largas filas a todas horas para los ltimos tres aos el derrumbe se mundializa, la Unin Europea
tomarse la foto, llenar el formulario y obtener el documento estaban exhibe su incapacidad para sostener la integracin y Estados Unidos
formadas por gente dispuesta a pertenecer a otra nacin inventada se asoma una y otra vez al precipicio.
o acreditarse como miembro de una patria viajera de artistas. Salimos del euro? se preguntan los ministros europeos Cmo
El problema es estar insatisfecho con nuestro pas o que las protegernos del contagio universal? Y del avance chino? Otras
desdichas de unos y otros se parezcan? Kochta & Kallenein, directores dudas semejantes sealan una tendencia a la desglobalizacin. Los
del Coro de Quejas de Teutonia, que han reunido protestas de pases del Mercosur, sobre todo Argentina, Brasil y Uruguay, que
maltratados por el neoliberalismo, desde Helsinski, su ciudad, hasta conocieron hace pocos aos los riesgos del abismo, estn entre las
Singapur y El Cairo, hicieron una pieza musical con frustraciones economas con mejor ritmo de crecimiento anual (7 al 9 %), se
de brasileos. Al escuchar a las personas en talleres de quejas expanden cuidando el desarrollo interno y logran cierta redistribucin
encuentran malestares transnacionales, que les dan la sensacin econmica y cultural.
de que ya vivan en esa ciudad hace muchos aos. Por supuesto, las artes no son reflejo de los procesos econmicos
Qu queda, entonces, de las identidades territoriales? Son, ms que ni polticos. De hecho esta Bienal rene obras recientes y de
una representacin de algo preciso, una actuacin, un modo de aos anteriores, como una reflexin de largo plazo. El movimiento
posicionarse en la geopoltica mundial. La mayor parte de las obras internacional del arte, con muchos focos de desarrollo no slo
reflexiona sobre ambigedades, logros parciales y fracasos, no con en las metrpolis, rene ahora miradas ms complejas sobre las
banderas y monumentos inamovibles sino con smbolos alterados articulaciones y fracturas mundiales, desde las revoluciones fallidas a
que miran dudosos a los vecinos (y a s mismos). las marchas de los indignados y desesperados de Egipto (Revolucin,
No obstante, hubo disconformes. Escuch protestas uruguayas por de Khaled Hafez). A diferencia de quienes conciben una bienal como
NSTOR GARCA CANCLINI, Mercosur: la bienal de la desglobalizacin 167
ESPAOL
una muestra coordinada por Aracy Amaral, donde artistas actuales
revisan las fronteras geogrficas y culturales de los pases de la
regin en dilogo con grabados, esculturas, pinturas de paisajes,
objetos domsticos y mapas de expediciones que documentaron
otras pocas. Videos, instalaciones sonoras y fsicas, fotos satelitales
de Google Earth retrabajan el sentido actual de las Misiones, las
movedizas fronteras, las mezclas indgenas con portugueses, espaoles,
africanos, italianos, rabes y judos pobladores de estas tierras.
El programa Ciudad no vista, por otro lado, convoc a artistas
brasileos y de otras nacionalidades a intervenir espacios y edificios
poco interesantes de Porto Alegre: el Observatorio Astronmico,
ruinas urbanas, el Viaducto Otvio Rocha, tubos de PVC subidos a
diez pilares que amplifican los sonidos del Aeromvil, tren urbano
silencioso que se desplaza por el aire con la fuerza de la presin del
vaco y genera reverberaciones necesarias pero que nadie escucha.
Santiago Sierra, en cambio, busc aturdir con los seis altavoces que
reproducen los himnos nacionales de los pases del Mercosur tocados
al mismo tiempo en los Jardines del Palacio Piratini, antigua sede
de los gobernadores portugueses.
No es posible citar ni la mitad de la constelacin de talleres y
acciones que buscaron incorporar a comunidades alejadas y hacer
circular a artistas de otras regiones. Destaco el proyecto pedaggico
curado por Pablo Helguera. En vez de difundir informacin, form
mediadores para que articularan el carcter procesual del trabajo
artstico con juegos y reflexiones del pblico. La investigacin, la
colaboracin y las tareas de interpretacin, constitutivas de los
trabajos artsticos contemporneos, eran incentivadas tambin
en los receptores. El curso previo para mediadores form a 780
universitarios de muchos Estados no slo de Porto Alegre que
ensearon a responder de forma imaginativa, creativa y flexible
ante las obras. Desglobalizar puede entenderse de dos maneras:
incumplir las promesas de integracin mundial dejando fuera a
pases o vastas poblaciones, pero tambin como el aprovechamiento
de movimientos globales para crear infraestructuras locales (fsicas
y humanas) que rebasen lo local. Inscribir a artistas, discursos y
pblicos en intercambios ms equilibrados, modificar las maneras
de experimentar lo propio y lo de los otros. No slo ocurra en
las obras que representaban naciones ficcionales, sino en las dems NSTOR GARCA CANCLINI: Profesor Distinguido en la Universidad
reelaboraciones de banderas, mapas, viajes y alianzas donde emergan Autnoma Metropolitana de Mxico e Investigador Emrito del
zonas de autonoma potica. Se trataba de imaginar las muchas Sistema Nacional de Investigadores de Mxico. Ha sido profesor en las
maneras de crear nuestro propio pas. universidades de Austin, Duke, New York, Stanford, Barcelona, Buenos
Aires y Sao Paulo. Su ms reciente libro es La sociedad sin relato.
Antropologa y esttica de la inminencia, publicado por Katz Editores.
NORMAS PARA PUBLICAO
A escultura de Victor Brecheret O uso do cantus firmus na Choral Fantasy, Op. 73 de Paul A. Pisk
Armindo Trevisan Any Raquel Souza Carvalho
Anlise musical: para quem? por qu? Czanne e o fotgrafo desconhecido
Cristina Caparelli Gerling Eduardo Vieira da Cunha
Espelho, espelho nosso, existe algum mais bonito do que ns? A utilizao das cores em alguns casos do retoque na restaurao
Flvio Mainieri Lenora Lerrer Rosenfield
Sobre a msica erudita brasileira, hoje Consideraes sobre o sistema das artes plsticas
Flvio Oliveira Maria Amelia Bulhes
O princpio de realidade na pintura do Renascimento - a questo Martn Fierro: a modernidade em debate
da perspectiva Maria Lcia Bastos Kern
Icleia Borsa Cattani Gravuras em metal maneira de Michelangelo durante o Cinquencento
A interpretao dos sonhos, segundo Freud, e o pesadelo Maria Lucia Cattani
de Clitemnestra, em squilo e Sfocles Perspectivas para a educao artstica na nova lei de diretrizes e bases
Ivo Bender Maura Penna
Macbeth: crime, poltica e medo Metodologia para uma educao musical: uma questo de
Luiz Paulo Vasconcellos conhecimento em bom-senso
A magia do silncio nas artes visuais Vera Regina Pilla Cauduro
Nilza Grau Haertel Acalantos
O valor educacional da arte Cristina Rolim Wolffenbttel
Raimundo Martins
A trova e a dcima no Rio Grande do Sul
Rose Marie Reis Garcia Porto Arte 4
A mscara, seu sentido e seu uso no treinamento do ator Volume III | maio | 1992
Sandra Dani
Don Juan em Kierkegaard
Alvaro Valls
Porto Arte 2 Pesquisa em artes visuais
Volume II | maio | 1991 Annateresa Fabris
O kitsch na arquitetura popular brasileira: manifestao essencialmente
A Escola de Artes e a profissionalizao do seu aluno urbana
Crio Simon Blanca Brites
Picasso: percepo e concepo Semitica e significao: uma introduo
Eduardo Vieira da Cunha Flvio Vinicius Cauduro
Vidas Secas: o filme, o livro A criao musical: consideraes psicodinmicas
Flvio Mainieri Marcello Guerchfeld
Mrio de Andrade: crtico de arte Poltica cultural do Estado Novo no campo das artes plsticas
Jos Augusto Avancini Maria Amelia Bulhes
A pintura a leo e a questo Van Eyck Sobre o significado da pesquisa em msica na universidade
Lenora Lerrer Rosenfield Maria Elizabeth Lucas
Consideraes sobre gravura artstica O processo de criao e a pesquisa nas artes plsticas
Nilza Grau Haertel Romanita Disconzi
Anotaes para um estudo sobre a vontade no processo de criao Percursos da educao artstica: um balano das diversas abordagens
do ator Sylvia Coutinho
Sandra Dani De monstros e mistrios: o fantstico e a estilizao em There are more
A assimilao e a estruturao da linguagem musical na infncia things, de Jorge Luis Borges
Vera Regina Pilla Cauduro Ivo Bender
Porto Arte 5 Porto Arte 7
Volume III | dezembro | 1992 Volume IV | novembro | 1993
Arte e psicanlise: encontro marcado por uma iluso O museu o mundo - arte e vida cotidiana na experincia de Hlio
Elida Starosta Tessler Oiticica
Apontamentos para uma dramaturgia regionalista Elida Starosta Tessler
Flvio Mainieri A pesquisa em histria da arte
O significado do jogo na educao infantil Annateresa Fabris
Joo Gilberto Gil Vanguarda brasileira, Hlio Oiticica
Iluminacin e deslumbramiento: anticipaciones de la imaginacin Celso F. Favaretto
Margarita Schultz Histoire de la critique/critique de lhistoire lart moderne nexiste pas
A importncia de (outras) imagens no ensino da arte Marc Jimenez
Martin Grossmann Artes plsticas no Brasil: vanguarda e internacionalizao nos anos 60
Escultura: encontros entre o perceber e o fazer Maria Amelia Bulhes
Mnica Zielinsky El grupo signo en el sistema de las artes, en Chile de comienzos de los
As habilidades motoras e sua contribuio para a apreenso do ritmo aos 60
musical na infncia Sylvia Rios M.
Vera Regina Pilla Cauduro Paysage/eros
Paul-Armand Gette
Porto Arte 6
Volume IV | maio | 1993 Porto Arte 8
Volume V | maio | 1995
Cinema e modernidade em Klaxon
Annateresa Fabris e Mariarosaria Fabris A fotografia oitocentista ou a iluso da objetividade
A liberdade de criao e a cultura popular Annateresa Fabris
Antonio Carlos Vargas Santanna O desejo de permanncia e do reconhecimento: uma abordagem do
Avatares de la critica retrato fotogrfico a partir do pensamento de Lacan
Carlos Espartaco Francisca Ferreira Michellon
Artes plsticas: participao e distino. Brasil anos 60/70 Relaes entre cinema e pintura: Senso e os macchiaioli
Maria Amelia Bulhes Mariarosaria Fabris
Diretrizes para uma educao artstica democratizante: a nfase na Unidades mveis de exposio
linguagem e nos contedos Maria Teresa Brunelli
Maura Penna Clement Greenberg: um crtico na histria, um crtico da histria
Arte contempornea e identidade cultural no Rio Grande do Sul (1980- Dominique Chteau
1990) Fontes e problemas metodolgicos em histria da arte
Icleia Borsa Cattani Maria Lcia Bastos Kern
Avaliao e o ensino das artes
Geraldo Orthof
Histria da arte latino-americana na Alemanha
Hans Haufe
A ruptura contempornea com as aporias vanguardistas na construo
de um novo paradigma esttico-social
Antonio Vargas
Semitica e semiologia: contrastes
Flvio Vincius Cauduro
Construo de imagens bi e tridimensionais
Suzete Venturelli
Porto Arte 9 Porto Arte 11
Volume V | maio | 1995 Volume VI | maio | 1996
Estetizao e estetizao profunda - ou a respeito da atualidade da Reflexes sobre as propostas de alguns movimentos artsticos dos anos 60
esttica nos dias de hoje Muriel Caron
Wolfgand Welsch A fenomenologia viva de Franz Walther
Aspectos da gravura de Carlos Martins Stphane Huchet
Maristela Salvatori O ndice indicado com o dedo
Olmpia e a questo do modelo Jean Lancri
Jean Lancri Joseph Beuys, artista internacional
Produo plstica e a instaurao de um campo de conhecimento Jacques Leenhardt
Sandra Rey Reflexes sobre a encenao autobiogrfica de Joseph Beuys
O consumo das artes Marion Hohlfeld
Edinice Mei Silva Formas e formulaes possveis entre a arte e a vida: Joseph Beuys
e Kurt Schwitters
Elida Tessler
Porto Arte 10 Duchamp versus Beuys ou a ironia versus paixo
Volume V | novembro | 1995 Vera Chaves Barcellos
Desfazer as dobra de alguma coisa que lhe havia sido dada toda
A histria da arte como prtica interdisciplinar dobrada, h alguns anos
Annateresa Fabris liane Chiron
Da arte nacional brasileira para a arte brasileira internacional
Tadeu Chiarelli
A crtica de arte nos anos 70: uma viso Porto Arte 12
Jos Augusto Avancini Volume VII | novembro | 1996
O concretismo na Amrica Latina: um ensaio sobre manifestos e
declaraes de artistas de 1946 a 1959 Mestrado em Artes Visuais: 5 anos
Neiva Fonseca Bohns NMERO ESPECIAL
Calvrio, sudrio e macaba: notas sobre uma direo da arte
contempornea
Alexandre dos Santos Porto Arte 13
Estetica tradicional e imagen informatica Volume VII | novembro | 1996
Margarita Schultz
Desvios do conhecimento - o monstro e a iconologia: reflexo maldita Ao 7 X: trivium com centauro, estrelas e danarinas
Marcia Tiburi liane Chiron
Caravaggio: imagens de um mundo barroco O caos e a ordem na pintura contempornea
Maria do Socorro Carvalho Gilbert Lascault
Entre mortos e feridos: a construo do discurso preservacionista em Presencia de la imagem informtica
dois intelectuais do patrimnio Margarida Schultz
Mario Chagas Corpo e controle: o olho do poder e o esquadrinhamento individual (uma
leitura foucaultiana dos primrdios da fotografia)
Alexandre Ricardo Dos Santos
Desconstruir/reconstruir
Annateresa Fabris
Da prtica teoria: trs instncias metodolgicas sobre a pesquisa em
poticas visuais
Sandra Rey
A imagem visual na nova histria e histria da arte
Maria Lcia Bastos Kern
Pontes entre Adorno e Gadamer
Alvaro Luiz Montenegro Valls
Pontos derivantes
Hlio Fervenza
Porto Arte 14 Porto Arte 16
Volume VIII | maio | 1997 Volume IX | maio | 1998
Porto Arte 15
Volume VIII | novembro | 1997 Porto Arte 17
Volume IX | novembro | 1998
A arte como evento - Journiac, Beuys, Duchamp
liane Chiron O caminho de Tirsias, ou reflexes sobre a cegueira: um ensaio sobre
Lart et la manire de donner sa langue au chat (vinte e um mais um cinco artistas brasileiros
fragmentos de LEnciclopdie du Facteur Cheval) Vera Chaves Barcellos
Jean Lancri Do terreno de circo ao olho mgico: pontos cegos e entreolhares
O gosto neobarroco na obra de Joo Cmara Hlio Fervenza
Silvana Brunelli Cmara obscura: algumas idias sobre a fotografia pinhole - nas artes,
tica e esttica na esttica, na educao
Alvaro Luiz Montenegro Valls Jochen Dietrich
tica museolgica y globalizacin cultural O maquinista
Gabriel Peluffo lida Tessler e Tereza Lenzi
Nas malhas da morte Evgen Bavcar: silncios, cegueiras e alguns paradoxos quase invisveis
Kathrin H. Rosenfield lida Tessler
Contra o esteticamente correto Uma cmera escura atrs de outra cmera escura
Marc Jimenez lida Tessler e Muriel Karon
Da esttica poitica Inapreensvel presena do tempo
Ren Passeron Evgen Bavcar
Traduo inter-semitica: uma experincia criativa
Romanita Disconzi
Porto Arte 18 Porto Arte 20
Volume X | maio | 1999 Volume XI | maio | 2000
Metamorfismo plstico: Lger e a representao da modernidade A temporada italiana de Pettroruti: consideraes sobre um relato
Dominique Chateau autobiogrfico
Maneiras de instalaes Annateresa Fabris
Sylviane Leprun Dois dilogos imaginrios: consideraes sobre a obra de Poussin
Reflexiones sobre el ejercicio de la pintura a partir de conceptos Priscila lufinoni
extraidos de la teora de Jacques Lacan
Roberto Fajardo NCLEO TEMTICO: QUESTES DE MUSEOLOGIA
El impacto de la globalizacin en la articulacin de las dinamicas A arte como valor e as instituies museolgicas
artsticas Maria Amelia Bulhes
Arturo Rodrguez Do perene ao transitrio na arte contempornea: impasses
Outro mundo Cristina Freire
Alexandre Melo Museu e interatividade: o exploratorium e uma entrevista com Paul
El hombre propone y la poca dispone. O cmo se dibuj el perfil del Doherty
Museo Rosa Galisteo de Rodrguez Francisco Marshal
Maria Teresa Constantn Venturas y desventuras de los estudios de pblico
Algumas questes metodolgicas sobre o estudo das formas Graciela Schmilchuk
de disseminao do pensamento vanguardista entre vizinhos MUVA: Museo Virtual de Artes el Pais
latinoamericanos Alcia Harber
Neiva Maria Fonseca Bohns
Identidade-territorialidade no contexto da II Bienal do Mercosul
Maria Amelia Bulhes Porto Arte 21
Volume XII | julho/agosto | 2004
DOSSI: Web arte: uma potica da Internet DOSSI: Migraes e Mutaes na Arte Contempornea
Organizao: Maria Amelia Bulhes Organizao: liane Chiron, Sandra Rey, Icleia Cattani
Fred Forest liane Chiron
Net.art Niki de Saint-Phalle: jardim migrante, caminho mutante
Silvia Laurentiz Annateresa Fabris
Tags e metatags? De Ted Nelson a Tim Berners-Lee A ilha da felicidade pelas lentes de Karl Marx
Laura Baigorri Bernard Paquet
Artistas latinos making global art A paisagem da pintura: migrao das camadas, mutao da
Maria Amelia Bulhes profundidade
Incurses ecolgicas na web art Icleia Borsa Cattani
Christine Mello Paisagens do exlio, lugares da utopia
Lucas Bambozzi: redes sociais e enfrentamento Carlos Alberto Murad
Gilbertto Prado Linhas estelares e traados do pensamento criador
Algumas experincias de arte em rede: projetos wAwRwT, Colunismo e Anas Lelivre
Desertesejo Georges Rousse. A arte de habitar do viajante
Fabio Oliveira Nunes Hong Biao Shen
Reflexes sobre a web arte em novos contextos Em Paris, entre China e Monglia, mutao da escultura
Raquel Fonseca Sandra Rey
A fotogenia como fundamento do desejo de transformao da aparncia Caminhar: experincia esttica, desdobramento virtual
Maria de Ftima Morethy Couto Mirtes Marins de Oliveira
Do moderno e do contemporneo na arte brasileira Apropriao e montagem: melancolia e utopia
Vincius Oliveira Godoy Leila Danziger
Ctrl+Art+Del Distrbios em arte e tecnologia Fbio Oliveira Nunes Micha Ullman: escavar, revolver, lembrar
Vera Beatriz Siqueira
Anita Malfatti: limites do moderno
Silvana Boone
Uma breve histria da curadoria Hans Ulrich Obrist
Porto Arte 30
Volume XIX | maio | 2011
Os textos (10/13,6), ttulos (16/25) e notas (8/10) dessa revista foram compostos em Gill Sans.
Papel couche fosco 90g/m2 (miolo) e carto supremo alta alcalino 250g/m2 (capa).
31
PORTO ARTE
NOVEMBRO, 2011