The exhibition Beyond the Modern takes its title from a book written by the Brazilian sociologist Gilberto Freyre (1900-1987) in 1973, Além do Apenas Moderno [Beyond the Merely Modern]. In it, Freyre argues that Western societies experienced, from the 1960s onwards, a transition to a threefold time, that is, one marked by the interdependence of past, present, and future.
In other words, even before Stephen Hawking (1942-2018) developed this same theory in his book A Brief History of Time (1988), sparking a debate about the arbitrary division, asymmetry, and illusion of time, Freyre was already reflecting on these issues, which would later occupy the brilliant British physicist.
Beyond sociology and quantum physics, this exhibition wants to discuss principally the reverberation of historical art movements, particularly Constructivism, in contemporary Brazilian painting. To this end, Beyond the Modern brings together three artists associated with the Neo-Concrete movement in Rio de Janeiro — Aluísio Carvão, Hélio Oiticica, and Milton Dacosta — and four contemporary painters — Cássio Michalany, recently deceased, Eduardo Sued, Paulo Pasta, and Rodrigo Castro.
Far from suggesting nostalgia, this association recognizes the necessity of embracing threefold time to create great art. It is unlikely that Hélio Oiticica would have achieved the synthesis of his Metaesquemas without drawing upon a historical work of Neoplasticism by Mondrian (Composition Number 3, 1917, now in the collection of the Gemeentemuseum in The Hague), which deals with the spatial displacement of the square figure.
Likewise, it is difficult to separate Paulo Pasta’s colors from the chromatic tradition of pre-Renaissance and European modernism, particularly Matisse, just as Cássio Michalany's painting is intrinsically connected to American minimalism and Milton Dacosta’s geometric abstraction. Finally, it is impossible not to associate Eduardo Sued with the constructive aspect of Neo-Concretism, especially the freedom in the use of color, a lesson he learned from the early Neo-Concrete Aluísio Carvão.
The dialogue between these artists and modern architecture and design is translated in the exhibition through significant works by architects who helped build a Brazil attuned to international modernity. These include the Ukrainian-born Warchavchik (1896-1972), considered the introducer of this school in Brazilian architecture, Oscar Niemeyer (1907-2012), the visionary behind Brasília, as well as figures such as Zalszupin (1922-2020), Lasar Segall (1889-1957), Joaquim Tenreiro (1906-1992), Oswaldo Bratke (1907-1997), Vilanova Artigas (1915-1985), and Jayme Fonseca Rodrigues (1905-1946).
Antonio Gonçalves Filho
curator