O Maravilhamento das Coisas (The Wonderment of Things)

With Daniel Barclay, Mariano Barone, Bruno Brito, Leda Catunda, Matheus Chiaratti, Tatiana Dalla Bona, Mayla Goerisch, Martin Lanezan, Mano Penalva and Sergio Pinzón

On view at Sancovsky Gallery (São Paulo) from March 1st until March 31st 2018

O Maravilhamento das Coisas  (The Wonderment of Things) comes from the desire to show the production of artists from different generations and countries, whose practice lies beyond categories, providing thoughts about the developments of daily life aesthetics in contemporary art, blurring the limits between erudite and popular art, figuration and abstraction, the original and the copy.

The use of the copy, is at the center of Daniel Barclay´s project Bambaismo. The colonial origin of the word Bamba describes the sealing of existing currencies, redefining the value of the original and refers nowadays in Peru, to the illegal copies of images and objects. Translating the practice to the art field, Daniel Barclay questions the value of the artwork, reproducing in a voluntarily imperfect way, copies of antiques sculptures and famous paintings. In this formal exercise, the intrinsic codes of the artwork remains, though altered through the successive readings.

A similar formal research characterize the artworks of Mayla Goerisch, Mano Penalva, Sergio Pinzón and Matheus Chiaratti. Distracting the physical qualities of ordinary objects, they transform them in sculptures or paintings, tearing down the classical art structures and searching completion through composition and color, in an iconography inspired by personal places or memories. Like this, Mano Penalva´s canvas bags or lounge chairs gain new volumes and functions, while Mayla Goerisch creates with Meeting Points, totems from piled colored plastic buckets. Sergio Pinzón, with its Variaciones sobre uma polo, parts from the lines of a t-shirt in an attempt to represent a landscape and Matheus Chiaratti superposes nuances of silk pieces in an immersive kind of painting, further developed in a wood sculpture, both reinventing nature´s colors.

Nature’s mystical dimension is at the core of Mariano Barone, Bruno Brito and Martin Lanezan’s artworks. In Martin Lanezan’s case, paintings, adorned with objects, carry popular symbology and seem to gather the world’s energies. Bruno Brito’s Coluna (Column), made of wood and concrete, evoques an axis mundis connecting the human to the universe, celebrating vernacular ingeniosity and imaginar while Mariano Barone, even though dialoguing with layers of informations that can be found on city walls, saves, in Zombies are good for your health, nature’s spirits, in a composition made of plastic canvases and rupestre inspired drawing.

Eventually, Tatiana Dalla Bona and Leda Catunda translate the contemporary visual saturation. Tatiana Dalla Bona reveals, in her assemblages, a city where poetry hides behind colored sidings and veils of building works. Meanwhile, Leda Catunda, with her almost sculpture Bipede observes the macroeconomy of the sports universe. In her artwork, organically articulated cells alternate NBA’s logos with traditional prints, forming a kind of exotic animal whose legs expand on the floor and whose contrasted skin refers on one hand to the feminine universe, to the “estética da maciez” (“softness aesthetic”), and on the other hand, to the brutality of the indispensable identification to a group and of the luxurious universe of professional sports.

O Maravilhamento das Coisas contemplates therefore, the appropriation strategies of personal and popular references, through the artist subjective and affective lens, projecting symbolic forms onto or beyond the walls. Creating new functions and significations, transposing well known places into the art field, this group show reveals the displacement operated by the artist, applying the contemporary art paradigm in its most intimate relationship with the audience. In this game of possibilities, of expansion and permeability of the concepts of artwork, beauty and finitude, we are invited to an empathic journey in the particular universe of these artists, in the playfield of art, the one of the wonderment of things.

Daniel Barclay , Lima, Perú, 1972

Multidisciplinary artist, its research is focused on the representation of identities and geographies; bringing closer the concepts through installations and paintings in which diverse reading codes coexist. He studied visual arts at Corrent Alterna art school (Lima) and Central Saint Martins (London). Lives and works in São Paulo.

Mariano Barone, Santa Fe, Argentina, 1985

Working mainly with drawing, painting and serigraphy, Mariano Barone composes intuitive graphic artworks, translating the city’s noise, contrasted sometimes with remains of nature. Currently graduating in visual arts at UNESP, he participated among other exhibitions in the 43e Art Salon of Ribeirão Preto (2017). Lives and works in São Paulo.

Bruno Brito, Jacaréi, Brasil, 1992

Multidisciplinary artist, its research crosses the fields of architecture and practices of the Brazilian vernacular universe. Bruno Brito is graduated in visual arts at UNESP. Lives and works in São Paulo.

Leda Catunda, São Paulo, Brasil, 1961

Multidisciplinary artist , Leda Catunda investigates the popular imaginary, exploring the limits of the pictorial field with voluptuous artworks, object like paintings, in which she mainly uses industrial materials and artisanal techniques, pointing out our world’s paradoxes, enchanting and saturated of informations and violence. She studied at FAAP and showed in Sout america, Europe and United States. Among her individual shows, the following exhibitions stand out: Leda Catunda: 1983–2008 (Estação Pinacoteca, São Paulo, 2009), Pinturas Recentes (Museu Oscar Niemeyer, Curitiba e MAM Rio de Janeiro, 2013) and  I Love You Baby (Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo, 2017). She participated in key group shows such as Pintura como Meio (MAC-USP 1983) and Como Vai Você, Geração 80 (Parque Lage 1984); as well as in the São Paulo (1983, 1985, 1994), Mercosul (Porto Alegre 2001) and Havana (1984) Biennales and in Oito Décadas de Abstração Informal (MASP – Art Museum of Arte de São Paulo, 2018). Lives and works in São Paulo.

Matheus Chiaratti,  Birigui, Brasil, 1988

Multidisciplinary artist, Matheus Chiaratti brings in his production, personal or historical memories from the religious, barocco or the countryside of São Paulo, tackling contemporary themes such as solitude and relationships. He graduated in Image and Sound from USFCar and from the Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA). Lives and works in São Paulo.

Tatiana Dalla Bona, Paris, França, 1981

Graduated in visual arts at FAAP in 2017, Tatiana Dalla Bona works with installation, assemblage, painting and drawing, reinterpreting graphically visual elements from the daily life such as architecture. She had her first solo show, FORMA, in 2017 curated by Maria do Carmo M. P. Pontes. Lives and works in São Paulo.

Mayla Goerisch, Curitiba, Brasil, 1984

Self taught artist, Mayla Goerisch graduated in History at Universidade Federal do Paraná. The artist explores diverse materials that she reorganizes in sculptures, paintings and objects, as fragments of a narrative of daily life. She participated to group shows at Jacarandá gallery, Saracura space, Casa Nubam and to the Fine Arts School fo Rio de Janeiro Biennale. Lives and works in Rio de Janeiro.

Martin Lanezan, General Juan Madariaga – Argentina, 1982

Martin Lanezan’ work revolves around painting, in whic he integrates popular objects and references, transforming the pictorial practice in a ritual. Graduated in art, orientation painting from UNA (Universidad Nacional de Arte, Argentina), he showed in Latin American cities and received the First Prize of Seleccion Proyecto A 2008 and the First Prize in Bairro Jovem, ArteBA 2012. Lives and works in São Paulo.

Mano Penalva, Salvador de Bahia, Brasil, 1987

Multidisciplinary artist, Mano Penalva observes and transposes the daily life aesthetics into the art field, breaking normality and the unilateral function of everyday objects. He is graduated in Social (2008, PUC-RJ), Social Sciences (PUC-RJ) and frequented free classes at Parque Lage. He showed in Latin America, United States and Europe, with highlights for his solo shows Balneário, Central Galeria (São Paulo, 2016); Estado Sul, Camelódromo (Porto Alegre, 2017); Andejos, Museu de Arte de Ribeirão Preto and for the group shows A Bela e a Fera, Central Galeria (São Paulo, 2017); Hecha la ley, hecha la trampa, Hangar (Barcelona, 2017); Simphony of Hunger: Digesting FLUXUS in five moviments, A PLUS A Gallery (Veneza, Itália, 2015); and CONTRAPROVA, Paço das Artes (São Paulo, 2015). Lives and works in São Paulo.

Sergio Pinzón, Bogotá, Colombia, 1988

Sergio Pizón appropriates and recreate images, questionning the reality behind them and opening ways for new readings. Graduated in visual arts from Universidad de Los Andes and visual poetics from USP, he participated of the gestion of the independent space Ateliê397 in São Paulo. Lives and works in Bogotá.