THE LOGIC OF THE PLACE
Museu da Cidade de São Paulo - Casa do bandeirante
07 april - 15 july
2019
The tradition present in Art History has always been a subject of reflection in the production of the artist Gustavo Rezende. The main materials he chooses to develop his works carry this heritage in their use. Moreover, conceptually the artist's work deals with the History of Art, pays reverence to it, while deconstructing it, reconstructing it in a fragmented universe, in ruins, immersed in the contemporary and recomposed with irony.
Gustavo Rezende occupies the Casa do Bandeirante with a construction that crosses its central axis. Seventy tons of granite stones distributed in a structure of forty meters long. The passage inside the building is interrupted; It is only possible to traverse the space by looking, through the circulation axes that the architecture of the house proposes, between door and window cracks. Seeing the work, or the house, is only possible by traversing the outer space.
The external and internal materialize in the work of Casa do Bandeirante, and become one. The interior moves outwards and consequently carries the exteriors inwardly. Placed out of the intimate space of the house by the presence of the stone building, the body is also visible. Transit is required if exposed to sun or rain. The work gains permanence status in space, is done as a ruin, and goes on in a time that is not shorter, if dense, is noted. It seems to be prior to the construction of Casa do Bandeirante itself.
Gustavo presented in 2004 at Mariantonia University Center “Squeeze or Black Geography”. In it, a black structure was at the same time a passageway into the converted sculpture room, where “Not without some irony - and perhaps some cruelty - the artist takes away the pleasure of sight in this way, offering us only a space to navigate. ,… Once again refusing to surrender in its entirety ”[1]. "The Logic of the Place" is built in close but opposite motion. The idea of ​​traffic here remains, if it is necessary to travel through space. But the work here is generous, it can be seen, and it shows the architecture where it is placed. Neither wall nor bridge, Gustavo's work does not give access, nor does it prevent vision. He converts the Casa do Bandeirante into a sculpture. Prevents access to the House to give visibility to it.
Douglas de Freitas
Curator
Sao Paulo City Museum
[1] Fernando Oliva in Squeeze or Black Geography, text accompanying the exhibition, later compiled in Gustavo Rezende - Sao Paulo: Publisher WMF Martins Fontes, 2013.
