This first solo show of the artist ALMANDRADE, represented by the gallery Gabinete de Arte k2o, it assembles works from more than four decades, all using art object to stimulate thought, to provoke reflections, according to criteria based on rationality, materiality and not by chance, on data economy. Without permitting concept to overlap artistic duty, the artist is committed to the research of artistic languages involving visual arts, poetry and concept.
The exhibition includes artworks in a diverse range of languages and medias, such as painting, drawings, engravings, installation and visual poems, besides objects and large open air sculptures. Some are recent, created after mockups from the 70’s or 80’, but never produced in large format before.
In his career, the transition through concretism and conceptual art is highlighted at the 70’s, which contributed strongly to the incessant search of a singular language, rid from synthetic vocab. His work was always different from the kind of art produced in Bahia (northeast of Brazil). Approaching the Neo-concrete and the visual poetry inherited from Lygia Pape, Hélio Oiticica and others with whom he was in contact with at the time.
Both pictorial and linguistic his works stand as a place of reflection, solitary and at the margin of the Brazilian cultural scene. After figurative essays at the beginning of the 70’s, his plastic research turned to the concretism and conceptual art. As a poet, his field is concrete poetry, the poem/process, producing visual poems. He is one of the main names of the visual and experimental poetry in Brazil with several essays published.
Black and white drawings, objects and installation projects, essentially cerebral, carefully paved in a primordial way of dealing with practical and conceptual issues, mark the artists output in the second half of the 70’s. He rediscovered color on the 80’s, when his works – paintings or sculptures -, gain a playful dimension, without losing coherence and the ability to entertain with intelligence.
He is a sculptor who works with color and space, and a painter that ponders about the forms, the trace and the color at the plain of the canvas.
Almandrade’s art dialogues with modernity, transits between the constructive, conceptual and the visual poetry, maintaining coherence with several medias using words to reinvent new readings. As Décio Pignatari used to say “Almandrade puts much thought at the miniatures of his creatures, whose nudeness implies muteness, limpid cleansing of the artistic eye, already weary of the fantastic history of art of this endless century, of this infinite millennium.” (1995). A century that has already come to past. The coherence and the rigor of the artist in dealing with different medias, including the word (poetry), turns Almandrade as a thinker who uses these supports to produce reflections.
Let no one doubt, the frugality of elements and data are not by chance. It is an aesthetic choice, entirely consistant with his tendency to synthesis, to the essential trace, to the barely vestigial. A nil which genesis resides in the absolute totality. So is his poetry.
About the artist
He is a visual artist, architect, master in urban drawing and a poet. He participated of several group shows, between them XII, XIII and the XVI Bienal de São Paulo; “Em Busca da Essência” – an special show of the XIX Bienal de São Paulo; IV Salão Nacional; Universo do Futebol at MAM/Rio; Feira Nacional (São Paulo); II Salão Paulista, I Exposição Internacional de Escultura Efêmeras (Fortaleza); I Salão Baiano; II Salão Nacional; Honorable mention at the I Salão Estudantil in 1972. He integrated groups shows of visual poems, multi-medias and installation projects in Brasil and overseas. He was one of the creators of the Grupo de Estudos de Linguagem da Bahia, who edited the “Semiótica” magazine in 1974. He had also more than twenty solo shows in Salvador, Recife, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia and São Paulo between 1975 and 1997; He also wrote about art, architecture, and urbanism in several newspapers and magazines. He was awarded in the artwork projects contest in the Museu de Arte Moderna in Bahia, 1981/82. Received the Fundarte award at the XXXIX São de Artes Plásticas in Pernambuco in 1986. He edited the visual poetry’s and/or visual-works booklet: “O Sacrifício do Sentido”, Obscuridades do Riso”, “Poemas”, “Suor Noturno” and “Arquitetura de Algodão”. He received the Copene award for culture and art in 1997. His works are in many private and public collections, such as: Museu de Arte Moderna da Bahia, Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, Museu de Arte Moderna de Sao Paulo, Museu de Arte do Rio de Janeiro, Museu de Arte do Rio Grande do Sul, Museu de Arte Moderna de Recife and the Pinacoteca Municipal de São Paulo.
Gabinete de Arte k2o
The gallery “Gabinete de Arte k2o” was created in 2013, looking foward to introduce contemporary artists in the market and the institutional scene. It privileges the most innovative art production, with a program of temporary shows that contemplates several languages and techniques. It represents brazilian and foreign artists and it this the only gallery from Brasilia that is present in some of the best art fairs in the world, such as Basel, Miami, New York, Chicago and others. Furthermore, it supports innovative projects and researches, has a workshop and lectures program, while also makes partnerships with other institutions, besides interventions in public areas. Finally it develops projects with visiting curators and artistic residencies, acting in the secondary market as well. Besides its office in Brasilia at the city center, it also exhibiting galleries at the Lago Sul and in Sao Paulo.
Media gallery
More info
Exhibition: ALMANDRADE
Open: July 4th to August 31st, Mondays to Friday, 9AM-6:30PM | Saturday 10AM:2PM, prior scheduling is required
Gabinete de Arte k2o
Endereço: SMDB Conjunto 31 Lote 1B – Lago Sul
Brasília – DF, CEP 71.680-310 Brasil
Tels: +55 61. 34681152 ramal 20
E-mail: mk.gabinetek2o@gmail.com
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