Rio Artists Explore Urban Coexistence with Exhibit in Niterói

By Ciara Long, Contributing Reporter

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Inspired by the topic of urban coexistence, the exhibition ‘Fronteiras e Impermanências’ (Frontiers and Impermanences) opened in Niterói’s Espaço Cultural Correios gallery this Saturday, January 21st. Admission is free, and the exhibition will remain in the Niterói gallery until March 11th.

The exhibition was curated by one of six contributing artists, Mário Camargo, and shows works from José Luiz Schaefer, Marcelo Rezende, Margaret de Castro, Patrícia Tavares and Silvia Neves.

Artists looked at Rio de Janeiro as an example of how diverse groups co-exist within the same city, and how groups interact with one another within such spaces.

Working with painting, collage and photography, artists drew inspiration from philosophical texts by French philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari. In particular, artists explored Deleuze and Guttari’s idea that groups exist in tribe-like forms within cities which “organize themselves into territories and create their own identities, which include or exclude individuals”.

The twenty works displayed in the Espaço Cultural Correios exhibit explore the boundaries between these groups and their interactions with each other in contemporary urban environments. Themes include how boundaries shift with virtual communication, and how human displacements generate different reactions and interactions in city spaces.

“Coexistence with the diverse is a mark of contemporaneity,” said artist and curator of the exhibition Mário Camargo. “The exhibition portrays this, showing the truth of each one, of each artist, about the moment we live in.”

Adding, “The stimulus for the construction of works is the fact that the theme of boundaries theme provokes the imagination and can be disturbing. After all, art is like a tool capable of creating this channel of communication between people so different, so far and so close.”

What: Visual art exhibition ‘Fronteiras e Impermanências’
When: Monday to Saturday, 11AM to 6PM until March 11th, 2017
Where: Espaço Cultural Correios, Avenida Visconde do Rio Branco, 481, Niterói
Entrance: Free