18 October–24 November 2012
Opening: October 18, 7–10pm
Galeria Nara Roesler
Av. Europa, 655, São Paulo, SP
01449-001 Brazil
Hours:
Monday–Friday 10–7pm;
Saturday 11–3pm
T +55 11 3063 2344
info [at] nararoesler.com.br
“The revolutionary artists of our days will either be ‘inventors’ or will not be; but inventors like the inventors from ancient times who, inspired by the naïveté of children, created by destroying their toys and, nurtured with pure imagination, forgot about themselves in the eternal search for the philosopher’s stone, in the errant streams where, today, science and magic are mistaken for one another.”
–Mário Pedrosa on Abraham Palatnik
Galeria Nara Roesler is pleased to announce Abraham Palatnik’s fourth solo exhibition at the gallery, which will open to the public on Thursday, 18 October. Curated by Frederico Morais, the exhibition is organized chronologically, mapping over 60 years of artistic production, spanning from early series such as Kinechromatic Devices, Kinetic Objects, Progressive Reliefs, Ludic Objects, to more recent works like Duco on paperboard paintings and W series.
Abraham Palatnik (b. 1928) is the founder of technological art in Brazil and one of the pioneers in kinetic art, alongside names such as Malina, Schöefer, and Healey. His first Kinechromatic Device: Azul e roxo em primeiro movimento (Blue and purple in first movement) was a milestone in the 1st Biennial of São Paulo of 1951. Containing 600 meters of electric wiring linking 101 lamps of various voltages and rotating several cylinders at varying speeds, it announced, as Mário Pedrosa expressed at the time, “the true art of the future.” Up until 1983, Palatnik created 33 Kinechromatic Devices exhibited in seven editions of the São Paulo Biennial (from 1953 to 1963) as well as biennials in Venice (1964), Cordoba (1966) and in individual and group shows both in Europe and in the United States.
Progressive Reliefs (1962–onwards), each identified by the material employed, arose from the artist’s constant visits to the carpenter’s shop, where he observed how fragments of logs, cut lengthwise and scattered on the floor, were spontaneous information on nature. Consisting of a bi-dimensional plane covered by a progressive horizontal-undulating rhythm, Progressive Reliefs suggest a virtual expansion that goes beyond the edges of the frame and expresses, as Palatnik comments, the artist’s role to “discipline the chaos regarding information.” From 1968 onwards, the artist began to use duplex paperboard to create his Progressive Reliefs. Piling up several pieces of duplex paperboard and creating a cluster whose top was cut off afterwards, they result in optical structures, allowing light to pass through their interstices, creating partially illuminated areas opening up and closing off according to the movement of the viewer.
A similar relational intent occurs in Palatnik’s Kinetic Objects, also showcased in the exhibition. Made with metallic rods and wires, equipped in their extremities with wooden discs painted of various colors, and plates moving slowly and silently powered either by clockwork or electromagnets, Kinetic Objects make visible the motors and engines that Kinechromatic Devices before obscured. In these Kinetic Objects, the continuous metamorphosis of shapes and colors generates a kinesthetic effect— motion giving way to fascination.
Other series by Palatnik showcased in the exhibition include Ludic Objects (1965), geometric shapes of different colors housed in a round glass base and set in motion by the viewer through a magnetized stick; Duco on Paperboard Paintings (1988), ten 37.5 x 37.5 cm paintings of duco on paperboard glued to fiberboard; and W (2004), a series of paintings that continues the artist’s discussion on the activation of the support and its materiality, regarding the abstract and/or figurative occupation of the surface.
About the artist
Abraham Palatnik was born in Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil, in 1928. He has taken part in the São Paulo (1951–1955, 1959, 1961, 1965–1969), Venice (1964), Cordoba (1966), and Mercosul (1997, 2005) biennials, as well as in important international kinetic art exhibitions, such as Mouvement 2, at Denise René gallery, in Paris; Lumière, Mouvement et Optique, at the Brussels Palace of Fine Arts, in 1965; Kunst-Licht-Kunst, at the Eindhoven Art Museum, Netherlands, and Kinetic Art, at the San Francisco Museum of Art, in 1966; Lights in Orbit, at the Howard Wise Gallery, New York, 1967; Arte Programatta e Cinética, at the Pallazo Reale, Milan, Italy, in 1983. He also participated in several Latin American and Brazilian art shows in Europe and the United States, such as Modernity – Art Brésilien du XXe. Siècle, Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris (1988); Art Construtif, Art Cinétique d’Amérique Latine, Denise René gallery, Paris (1999); Heterotopias – Médio Siglo Sin Lugar 1918–1968, Reina Sofía Museum, Madrid (2001); Dimensions of Constructive Art in Brazil, Houston Museum of Fine Arts, USA, 2007.
In Brazil, the most prominent group shows were: V Resumo de Arte Jornal do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro (1972); Arte Brasil Hoje – 50 anos Depois, Collectio gallery, São Paulo, 1972; Projeto Construtivo Brasileiro em Arte – 1950-1962, Rio de Janeiro Museum of Modern Art and Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo (1977); A Nova Dimensão do Objeto, Museum of Contemporary Art – University of São Paulo (1986); Panorama de Arte Brasileira Atual, Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo (1986, 1993); Tridimensionalidade na Arte Brasileira do Século XX, Itaú Cultural, São Paulo (1997); Arte Construtiva no Brasil: coleção Adolpho Leirner, Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo (1998); Máquinas de Arte, Itaú Cultural, São Paulo (1999); Máquinas Poéticas, Casa do Pontal museum, Rio de Janeiro (2011).
Main solo shows of the artist include: Hochschule Museum, Saint Galen, Switzerland and Studio F gallery, Ulm, Germany, in 1964; I Howard Wise Gallery, New York, and Petite Galerie, Rio de Janeiro, in 1965; Barcinski gallery, Rio de Janeiro, in 1971; Bonino gallery, Rio de Janeiro, in 1977; Instituto dos Arquitetos do Brasil – Rio de Janeiro, in 1981; Retrospectiva 1942, Instituto Itaú Cultural, São Paulo, in 1998; Niterói Museum of Contemporary Art, overview of his work, 1999; Pioneer Palatnik: Painting Machines and Decelerating Machines, Instituto Itaú Cultural, São Paulo, 2002; Galeria Nara Roesler, São Paulo, 2005; Ordenando as Nuvens, Galeria Nara Roesler, São Paulo, in 2008; Ocupação Abraham Palatnik, Instituto Itaú Cultural, São Paulo, in 2009; Denise René Gallery, Paris, 2012; Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, 2013.
