Social Fabric

Art and Activism in Contemporary Brazil

Edited by Maria Emilia Fernandez, Adele Nelson and MacKenzie Stevens

168 Pages, 8.00 x 10.00 x 0.70 in, 130 illustrations

Distributed for The Visual Arts Center, University of Texas at Austin

Sales Date: November 7, 2023

168 Pages, 8.00 x 10.00 x 0.70 in, 130 illustrations

9781477328538 : November 2023

$29.95

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9781477328460 : November 2023

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Description
Author
Contents

Social Fabric: Art and Activism in Contemporary Brazil brings together the work of ten artists who reflect upon the long-standing histories of oppressive power structures in the territory now known as Brazil. Blurring the line between art and activism and spanning installation, painting, performance, photography, sculpture, and video, these artists contribute to local and global conversations about the state of democracy, racial injustice, and the violence inflicted by the nation-state. This first English-language, book-length study of contemporary Brazilian art in relationship to activism assembles artist-authored texts, interviews, essays, and a conceptual mapping of Brazilian history to illuminate the function of art as a platform for critical engagement with the historical, political, and cultural configurations of a particular place. By refusing to remain neutral, these artists create spaces of vibrant and vital community and self-construction to explore how healing and justice may be possible, especially in the Black, LGBTQIA+, and Indigenous communities to which many of them belong.

Maria Emilia Fernandez is the assistant curator at the Visual Arts Center at UT Austin. She earned her MA in art history at UT Austin and is an alumna of the Center for Latin American Visual Studies (CLAVIS).

Adele Nelson is an associate professor and associate director of the Center for Latin American Visual Studies (CLAVIS) in the Department of Art and Art History at UT Austin. She is the author of Forming Abstraction: Art and Institutions in Postwar Brazil and Jac Leirner in Conversation.

MacKenzie Stevens is the director and curator of the Visual Arts Center at UT Austin. She has organized solo exhibitions with Carmen Argote, Nikita Gale, Juan Pablo González, Madeline Hollander, Lisa Lapinski, Kate Newby, Michael Queenland, Luiz Roque, and Kenneth Tam, among others, and is the editor of Miss Swiss, the first monograph focusing on the work of Lisa Lapinski.

Preface: Brazilian Art at the Visual Arts Center | MacKenzie Stevens

Introduction | Adele Nelson and MacKenzie Stevens

Artist Interviews

Stitching Memory: Interview with Rosana Paulino | Lorraine Leu

Quotidian Transmutations: Interview with Castiel Vitorino Brasileiro | Maria Emilia Fernandez

Listening to the Collective Voice: Interview with Aline Motta | Maria Emilia Fernandez

Plates

Artist Texts

Carta aos ind.genas do planeta Marte com c.digos de reconhecimento do planeta Terra / Letter to the Indigenous Peoples of Planet Mars with Recognition Codes from Planet Earth | Denilson Baniwa

Jupiter is Here. Celestial is Everything. | Castiel Vitorino Brasileiro

Fundamento / Foundation | Maré de Matos

Installation Views

Artist Entries

Denilson Baniwa | Thiago Ferreira

Castiel Vitorino Brasileiro | Maysa Martins

Guerreiro do Divino Amor | Jana La Brasca

Jaime Lauriano | Lucy Quezada

Mar. de Matos | Chasitie Brown

Aline Motta | Jennifer Sales

Lais Myrrha | Pilar Dirickson Garrett

Antonio Ob. | Thiago Ferreira