Brasil! Brasil! The Dawn of Modernity

Brasil! The dawn of modernity

In the winter of 1944, the Royal Academy of Arts organised the "Exhibition of Modern Brazilian Painting" for three weeks in its large, neoclassical main galleries. The title of the show is somewhat misleading, as it was actually two different exhibitions in one: the first, the 'Exhibition of Modern Brazilian Painting', comprised 80 paintings and 86 works on paper, shown in two galleries; and the second, 'Brazil Builds', contained 192 photographs and occupied a single gallery. Between 1947 and 1948, both the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo (MAM-SP) and the Museu de Arte de São Paulo (MASP) and the Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro (MAM-RJ) opened, and one art critic described these initiatives as "signs of Brazil's desire to communicate with its own artists and to link up with these international centres of artistic expression". Not long after, in 1951, Brazil inaugurated the Bienal Internacional de São Paulo: the first biennial exhibition in the world after Venice and a demonstration of the value Brazil placed on art and culture at the time, emphasising its determination to be part of the emerging international art scene of the post-war period. The Semana de Arte Moderna (Modern Art Week) in 1922 is considered the starting signal for the development of Brazilian modernism, from which a first generation of artists emerged, including Anita Malfatti (1889-1964) and Vicente do Rego Monteiro (1899-1970). The genuinely Brazilian aspect of this modernism, as postulated by the writer Oswald de Andrade, was the role of "national identity". In a manifesto, he called for foreign European culture to be devoured, "digested" and utilised through its transformation in order to forge an independent Brazilian art. This also included the "devouring" of indigenous and Afro-Brazilian cultures. The two artists mentioned above and other protagonists such as Lasar Segall (1891-1957) and Tarsila do Amaral (1886-1973) are today recognised as having a certain social distance to indigenous visual language and Afro-Brazilian rituals, which was finally overcome by a second generation around Djanira da Motta e Silva (1914-1979) and Rubem Valentim (1922-1991). Now all these artists and their works are causing a stir in exhibitions such as "Foreigners Everywhere" at the 60th Venice Biennale (curated by Adriano Pedrosa), as after the "digested" formalist conquest by European modernism, a completely unique visual language has emerged in the works. International interest in the concept of global modernism has been strong for some time and scientific parallels to the challenges of European modernism are being addressed, as are the political, social and cultural differences. "Brazil! Brasil! - The Dawn of Modernity" presents in the exhibition and with this comprehensive publication the different ways in which Brazilian artists have developed their distinctive modern visual language and at the same time provides an introduction to the formative political, social and economic conditions by presenting ten positions; key stations in literature, music, design and architecture were also addressed. The Zentrum Paul Klee had its first opportunity for intercultural exchange in 2019 with the exhibition "Paul Klee - Unstable Balance", curated by Fabienne Eggelhöfer, which was received with great interest by the Brazilian public on its tour from Saõ Paulo via Rio de Janeiro to Belo Horizonte.

Exhibition:
Paul Klee Centre Bern, 7/9/2024 - 5/1/2025
Royal Academy of Arts, London, 28/1 - 21/4/2025

Artists: Anita Malfatti, Vicente do Rego Monteiro, Tarsila do Amaral, Candido Portinari, Lasar Segall, Flávio de Carvalho, Alfredo Volpi, Djanira da Motta e Silva, Geraldo Barros, Rubem Valentim

The exhibition is organised by the Zentrum Paul Klee, Bern, in collaboration with the Royal Academy of Arts, London