"Tropicalities" on Vortic Art curated, curated by María Wills.
Taking Hélio Oiticica's Tropicália as an ethos, the exhibition "Tropicalities" aims to bring together artists from diverse regions to present alternative perspectives of the 'tropical,' moving beyond its exotic stereotypes. In 1967, amidst intense repression from the dictatorship, Hélio Oiticica unveiled his penetrable environment, Tropicália. This period saw massive student strikes, escalating violence, and censorship. In response, artists and intellectuals utilized culture to express political dissent. Oiticica, in particular, reflected on the necessity of breaking the notion of art as a domain exclusive to the elite.
The avant-garde in Brazil embraced the idea of using art as a tool for collective solutions. Popular culture was ingrained as a core aspect of thought. Oiticica's environment, presented at the modern art museum in Rio, sought inspiration from the favelas as a social construct. The tropical concept became political, catalyzing participation and a commentary on foreign cultural influences in the art scene. By bringing Oiticica's environment into contemporary discourse, the exhibition provides much-needed creative inspiration for today's artists. It offers diverse and alternative perspectives on the "tropical" and provides insight into the enchanted and absorbing symbolism it brings to visual culture.
As curator Pablo León de la Barra suggests, the tropics represent a state of mind—a different perception of space, time, and geography resisting neoliberalism's efficiency, overproduction, overconsumption, and overaccumulation. This statement, combined with reflections and artistic inquiries into the possibilities and contradictions of creating within territories of natural exuberance and local cultural and ritualistic abundance amidst corrupt governance and political unrest, forms the central purpose of the exhibition's selection.
Through the works of artists Alexander Apóstol, Gloria Sebastián Fierro, Radamés Juni Figueroa, Gabriela Pez, Lucia Pizzani, Samuel Sarmiento, and Vanessa da Silva, the exhibition aims to reveal the many complexities and tensions inherent in the concept of the tropical.
The avant-garde in Brazil embraced the idea of using art as a tool for collective solutions. Popular culture was ingrained as a core aspect of thought. Oiticica's environment, presented at the modern art museum in Rio, sought inspiration from the favelas as a social construct. The tropical concept became political, catalyzing participation and a commentary on foreign cultural influences in the art scene. By bringing Oiticica's environment into contemporary discourse, the exhibition provides much-needed creative inspiration for today's artists. It offers diverse and alternative perspectives on the "tropical" and provides insight into the enchanted and absorbing symbolism it brings to visual culture.
As curator Pablo León de la Barra suggests, the tropics represent a state of mind—a different perception of space, time, and geography resisting neoliberalism's efficiency, overproduction, overconsumption, and overaccumulation. This statement, combined with reflections and artistic inquiries into the possibilities and contradictions of creating within territories of natural exuberance and local cultural and ritualistic abundance amidst corrupt governance and political unrest, forms the central purpose of the exhibition's selection.
Through the works of artists Alexander Apóstol, Gloria Sebastián Fierro, Radamés Juni Figueroa, Gabriela Pez, Lucia Pizzani, Samuel Sarmiento, and Vanessa da Silva, the exhibition aims to reveal the many complexities and tensions inherent in the concept of the tropical.
Exhibition available until February 27, 2024.
December 5, 2023
