sexta-feira, 15 de dezembro de 2017

Batarda, the Young



Colheita 1943


O jovem Eduardo Batarda, que viveu e desenhou em Londres entre 1971 e 1974, o ilustrador da Arte de Furtar, foi um artista interessante, e um excelente humorista gráfico e verbal. Depois, não deixando nunca de ser um contorcionista semântico, o regresso ao espaço-tempo indígena fez dele um maneirista à procura da 'fine art', atormentado com não problemas das Belas Artes, do qual foi nascendo uma obra decorativa, burilada gongoricamente e cada vez mais desinteressante, ainda que progressivamente apaladada para os gostos institucionais da ignara corte local. Nunca deveria ter sido pintor.

De resto, recordo umas noitadas dicotómicas nos idos anos 80 e 90 do século passado com mais um expatriado cultural iludido por uma pseudo revolução que em breve se revelaria uma farsa democrática. O que aprendeu de bom aprendeu fora do seu país, ou seja, a cepa promissora da sua arte desabrochou em Londres e por lá deveria ter sucessivamente florido e crescido. De resto, os bolseiros da Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian que estagiaram na Swingeing London cometeram todos, exceto Paula Rego, o mesmo pecado: regressar à terrinha. Portugal nunca foi no século 20, como se sabe, um bom terroir para a arte moderna e 'contemporânea'.

Convidei o Eduardo Batarda para uma exposição individual na Casa de Bocage, em 1983. Escrevi um pequeno texto sobre a transição do período londrino para o que viria a ser um mergulho no que então se chamou regresso à pintura! Desde então fui acompanhando de longe a sua obra, com a mesma melancolia que outras promessas fulgurantes (Carneiro, Ângelo, etc.) acabaram por provocar no meu sincero desejo de ver e perceber a arte portuguesa. Salva-se, ainda assim, um amor de juventude: a obra de Álvaro Lapa. Era absolutamente lúcido quando escrevia ou pintava.

Eduardo Batarda, Misquoteros, 2014/15

Excursão teórica



Batarda, o Velho 

Os textos nos quadros dos Misquoteros e das séries seguintes não foram escritos com outra intenção do que a de pertencer/aparecer em pinturas. A sua ambição ensaística é nula, e a sua "qualidade" literária inexistente. Como é óbvio, destinam-se a ser lidos, e não pretendo que funcionem "apenas" como elementos compositivos ou como ingredientes formais. 
Nas artes visuais há uma infinidade de obras que utilizam o texto sem mais acrescentos, e essa infinidade inclui muitas e muitas pinturas. Nada de especial, portanto. 
Para responder mais, tenho que lembrar que basta ver os quadros para verificar que as superfícies, que são o que se costuma chamar "superfícies pictóricas", estão  animadas (se assim  me posso exprimir) por aquilo que funciona como um sistema que regulariza e normaliza os conjuntos – para além dos letterings e dos textos, ou da numeração das frases: falo de imagens com figura e fundo, garantindo a presença de duas cores ou tonalidades da mesma cor, ou de três ou mesmo quatro, em raros casos. 
in “Três perguntas a Eduardo Batarda”, por Isabel Carlos, Contemporânea, 2017.

Góngora 
Góngora aparentemente não tinha grande apreço pela tipografia e pelas vantagens do livro impresso. Apesar de ter tido desde muito cedo admiradores da sua obra, apenas em 1623 empreendeu uma tentativa de publicação, a qual, apesar das cartas trocadas com o editor e do aparente empenho do autor, não logrou êxito. 
[...] 
Apesar de já nas suas obras iniciais encontrarmos o típico conceptismo do barroco, Góngora, cujo talento era o de um esteta com forte tendência para a autocrítica (costumava dizer: el mayor fiscal de mis obras soy yo), não se conformava com os cânones existentes. Assim, decidiu tentar, segundo as suas próprias palavras, hacer algo no para muchos e intensificar ainda mais a retórica e a imitação da poesia latina clássica. Para tal, introduziu numerosos cultismos e una sintaxe baseada no hipérbato e na simetria. 
Estava igualmente muito atento à sonoridade do verso, que cuidava como um autêntico músico da palavra. De Góngora pode-se dizer que era um grande pintor dos sons da linguagem com que enchia, com a perfeição de um Epicuro, os seus versos de matizes sensoriais de cor, som e tacto. 
Para além desse exacerbado culto estético, num processo a que Dámaso Alonso, um dos seus principais estudiosos, chamou elusões e alusões, convertia cada um dos seus poemas, com particular destaque para os da sua fase mais tardia, num obscuro exercício para mentes despertas e eruditas, como uma espécie de adivinha ou desafio intelectual destinado a causar prazer na sua decifração.

—in Luis de Góngora y Argote (Wikipédia)
By Art & Language (Michael Baldwin (born 1945) and Mel Ramsden).
- Photographed by Smuconlaw on 27 June 2013, 17:42:31., CC BY-SA 4.0


Historical Painting, 1973 
I always admired novelists and comic-strip artists for their "God-like" power of recreating realities on any level. In the series of Notes (1 to 9) I started scribbling a mixture of figures and writing which gradually became more defined (I did not depart from comic-strips as I did in my works of the '60's). With the introduction of a completely coloured background (in the Column series, World Map, etc.), I have gotten into a sort of historical painting where all kinds of data and ideas — historical, economic, poetic, topical — are presented in a unified style. For the sake of clarity, data and interpretations are both written down and depicted visually. Blue colors denote USA, violet Europe, red to yellow socialist countries, and green to brown the Third World. 
Propaganda  
Like many people, I began to understand during the late '60's that words like "imperialism", capitalism", "exploitation", "alienation" were not mere ideas or political slogans, but stood for terrifying, absurd and inhumane conditions in the world. Living in LBJ's and Nixon's America during the Vietnam war — culminating in the Christmas '72 terror bombings of Hanoi and Haiphong and Watergate — it became impossible not to deal in my work — once I had the stylistic tools — with what was going on around me: Guernica, multiplied a million times. 
Picasso, in his painting, reacted to Guernica by sharpening the emotional impact of his figures with expressionist distortion. My approach has been to orchestrate data, so people will — at best — both understand and be outraged. Will the pictures still function as a sensual and formal experience? Will the lettering also function as rhythmic percussion patterns? Can the pattern of facts become poetry? That is for the spectator to judge.
Obviously, most artworks (neo-Dada, Pop-art, conceptual art) use data that are "non-committal", "unimportant" per se. Will facts about economic exploitation or torture techniques destroy the balance and make the works "propaganda"? If so, are not Goya's war-etchings "propaganda" too? 
Radical Chic  
Same have criticized me for trying to sell "radical art" to the rich people and institutions of the West. By the same token Costa-Gravas should not have made State of Siege as a commercial feature film, reaching a very large public. Or Peter Weiss should be reproached for taking in royalties from plays on Vietnam and Trotsky. 
The visual artist in the West can only reach out to a wider audience via the galleries. Only after becoming known through gallery shows will he appear in museums, print editions and art books. 
Ideally, I would like to be able to sell enough expensive originals to pay for the manufacture of mass multiples, unsigned very large editions, available at the price of a record or a book and create an alternate distribution system. A first attempt in this direction is my reproduction of (a section of the drawing for) World Map, on newsprint, 80 x 100 cm, folded and inserted into the May '72 issue of a magazine, Liberated Guardian (circulation: 7000 copies, price: 25 cents).

Öyvind Fahlström
New York
May, 1973

—in "Historical Painting." Flash Art (Milan) Nr. 43, December 1973 / January 1974, 14.

quinta-feira, 7 de dezembro de 2017

Documenting what, how, and against who?

Gerhard Richter
 Porträt Arnold Bode
 (Portrait of Arnold Bode, 1964)[cropped]

d14

159 invited artists

6 born in Germany


  • Can you imagine an exhibition in US with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Russia with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in China with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Japan with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in UK with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in India with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Turkey with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Iran with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Brasil with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in France with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Spain with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?
  • Can you imagine an exhibition in Portugal with such a proportion of native artists relative to non native ones?

Artists

Abounaddara
Akinbode Akinbiyi
Nevin Aladağ
Danai Anesiadou
Andreas Angelidakis
Aristide Antonas
Rasheed Araeen
Ariuntugs Tserenpil
Michel Auder
Alexandra Bachzetsis
Nairy Baghramian
Sammy Baloji
Arben Basha
Rebecca Belmore
Sokol Beqiri
Roger Bernat
Bili Bidjocka
Ross Birrell
Llambi Blido
Nomin Bold
Pavel Brăila
Geta Brătescu
Miriam Cahn
María Magdalena Campos-Pons and Neil Leonard
Vija Celmins
Banu Cennetoğlu
Panos Charalambous
Nikhil Chopra
Ciudad Abierta
Marie Cool Fabio Balducci
Anna Daučíková
Moyra Davey
Yael Davids
Agnes Denes
Manthia Diawara
Beau Dick (1955–2017)
Maria Eichhorn
Hans Eijkelboom
Bonita Ely
Theo Eshetu
Aboubakar Fofana
Peter Friedl
Guillermo Galindo
Regina José Galindo
Israel Galván, Niño de Elche, and Pedro G. Romero
Daniel García Andújar
Pélagie Gbaguidi
Apostolos Georgiou
Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi
Gauri Gill
Marina Gioti
Beatriz González
Douglas Gordon
Hans Haacke
Constantinos Hadzinikolaou
Irena Haiduk
Ganesh Haloi
Anna Halprin
Dale Harding
David Harding
Maria Hassabi
Edi Hila
Susan Hiller
Hiwa K
Olaf Holzapfel
Gordon Hookey
iQhiya
Sanja Iveković
Amar Kanwar
Romuald Karmakar
Andreas Ragnar Kassapis
Kettly Noël
Bouchra Khalili
Khvay Samnang
Daniel Knorr
Katalin Ladik
Lala Rukh (1948–2017)
David Lamelas
Rick Lowe
Alvin Lucier
Ibrahim Mahama
Narimane Mari
Mata Aho Collective
Mattin
Jonas Mekas
Angela Melitopoulos
Phia Ménard
Lala Meredith-Vula
Gernot Minke
Marta Minujín
Naeem Mohaiemen
Hasan Nallbani
Joar Nango
Rosalind Nashashibi and Nashashibi/Skaer
Negros Tou Moria
Otobong Nkanga
Emeka Ogboh
Olu Oguibe
Rainer Oldendorf
Pauline Oliveros (1932–2016)
Joaquín Orellana Mejía
Christos Papoulias
Véréna Paravel and Lucien Castaing-Taylor
Benjamin Patterson (1934–2016)
Dan Peterman
Angelo Plessas
Nathan Pohio
Pope.L
Postcommodity
Prinz Gholam
R. H. Quaytman
Gerhard Richter
Abel Rodríguez
Tracey Rose
Roee Rosen
Arin Rungjang
Ben Russell
Georgia Sagri
Máret Ánne Sara
Ashley Hans Scheirl
Marilou Schultz
David Schutter
Algirdas Šeškus
Nilima Sheikh
Ahlam Shibli
Zef Shoshi
Mounira Al Solh
Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stephens
Eva Stefani
K. G. Subramanyan (1924–2016)
Vivian Suter
El Hadji Sy
Sámi Artist Group (Keviselie/Hans Ragnar Mathisen, Britta Marakatt-Labba, Synnøve Persen)
Terre Thaemlitz
Piotr Uklański
Jakob Ullmann
Antonio Vega Macotela
Cecilia Vicuña
Annie Vigier & Franck Apertet (les gens d’Uterpan)
Wang Bing
Lois Weinberger
Stanley Whitney
Elisabeth Wild
Ruth Wolf-Rehfeldt
Ulrich Wüst
Zafos Xagoraris
Sergio Zevallos
Mary Zygouri
Artur Żmijewski

Zainul Abedin (1914–1976)
Stephen Antonakos (1926–2013)
Arseny Avraamov (1886–1944)
Ernst Barlach (1870–1938)
Étienne Baudet (ca. 1638–1711)
Samuel Beckett (1906–1989)
Franz Boas (1858–1942)
Arnold Bode (1900–1977)
Lorenza Böttner (1959–1994)
Marcel Broodthaers (1924–1976)
Lucius Burckhardt (1925–2003)
Abdurrahim Buza (1905–1986)
Vlassis Caniaris (1928–2011)
Sotir Capo (1934–2012)
Cornelius Cardew (1936–1981)
Ulises Carrión (1941–1989)
Agim Çavdarbasha (1944–1999)
Chittaprosad (1915–1978)
Jani Christou (1926–1970)
Chryssa (1933–2013)
André du Colombier (1952–2003)
Gustave Courbet (1819–1877)
Christopher D’Arcangelo (1955–1979)
Bia Davou (1932–1996)
Maya Deren (1917–1961)
Ioannis Despotopoulos (1903–1992)
Thomas Dick (1877–1927)
Carl Friedrich Echtermeier (1845–1910)
Maria Ender (1897–1942)
Forough Farrokhzad (1935–1967)
Conrad Felixmüller (1897–1977)
Pavel Filonov (1883–1941)
Niccolò di Pietro Gerini (1340–1414)
Tomislav Gotovac (1937–2010)
Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm (1785–1863, 1786–1859)
Ludwig Emil Grimm (1790–1863)
Giovanni di ser Giovanni Guidi (1406–1486)
Cornelia Gurlitt (1890–1919)
Louis Gurlitt (1812–1897)
Nikos Hadjikyriakos-Ghika (1906–1994)
Oskar Hansen (1922–2005)
Sedje Hémon (1923–2011)
Theodor Heuss (1884–1963)
Karl Hofer (1878–1955)
Ralph Hotere (1931–2013)
Albert Jaern (1893–1949)
Iver Jåks (1932–2007)
Sunil Janah (1918–2012)
Alexander Kalderach (1880–1965)
Tshibumba Kanda Matulu (1947–1981 disappeared)
Leo von Klenze (1784–1864)
Kel Kodheli (1918–2006)
Louis Kolitz (1845–1914)
Spiro Kristo (1936–2011)
KSYME-CMRC (founded 1979)
Anna “Asja” Lācis (1891–1979)
Maria Lai (1919–2013)
Yves Laloy (1920–1999)
Valery Pavlovich Lamakh (1925–1978)
George Lappas (1950–2016)
Karl Leyhausen (1899–1931)
Max Liebermann (1847–1935)
George Maciunas (1931–1978)
Ernest Mancoba (1904–2002)
Oscar Masotta (1930–1979)
Mikhail Matyushin (1861–1934)
Pandi Mele (1939–2015)
Tina Modotti (1896–1942)
Benode Behari Mukherjee (1904–1980)
Krzysztof Niemczyk (1938–1994)
Ivan Peries (1921–1988)
David Perlov (1930–2003)
André Pierre (1915–2005)
Dimitris Pikionis (1887–1968)
Dmitri Prigov (1940–2007)
Hasan Reçi (1914–1980)
W. Richter
Anne Charlotte Robertson (1949–2012)
Erna Rosenstein (1913–2004)
August Wilhelm and Friedrich Schlegel (1767–1845, 1772–1829)
Bruno Schulz (1892–1942)
Scratch Orchestra (1969–1974)
Tom Seidmann-Freud (1892–1930)
Allan Sekula (1951–2013)
Baldugiin Sharav (1869–1939)
Amrita Sher-Gil (1913–1941)
Vadim Sidur (1924–1986)
August Spies (1855–1887)
Foto Stamo (1916–1989)
Gani Strazimiri (1915–1993)
Władysław Strzemiński (1893–1952)
Alina Szapocznikow (1926–1973)
Yannis Tsarouchis (1910–1989)
Antonio Vidal (1928–2013)
Albert Weisgerber (1878–1915)
Lionel Wendt (1900–1944)
Johann Joachim Winckelmann (1717–1768)
Fritz Winter (1905–1976)
Basil Wright (1907–1987)
Andrzej Wróblewski (1927–1957)
Ivan Wyschnegradsky (1893–1979)
Iannis Xenakis (1922–2001)
Androniqi Zengo Antoniu (1913–2000)
Pierre Zucca (1943–1995)


Last (unsustained) paragraph by 73 of the 159 participants:


“A Germany-first, Kassel-only, Eurocentric stance goes against the values of documenta 14. Our exhibition, documenta 14, was built up by a vast diversity of artistic practices, and drew on the legacy of the previous four editions of documenta, in which the (global) South confidently asserted a position within contemporary art production, further challenging and changing the key parameters of the discourse in question.[21] Documenta should not turn away from its own trajectory and return to a conservative triumphalist European model of a contemporary art exhibition. On the contrary, it must stay free from political interference in order to be able to add important voices to contemporary discourses and fulfill its mission of materializing artistic freedom.”