Zeca Camargo: visit Pinacoteca do Ceará – 05/07/2023 – Zeca Camargo

Are you going to travel to Ceará? Beach, right? Of course, after all, this is the state with one of the most beautiful coastlines in Brazil. But what if I invite you to visit Fortaleza to see, um, contemporary art?

Surprise? Imagine mine when, on a visit to the capital at the end of April, a TV colleague asked me with that wonderful accent: “Mar, boy, have you been to the Pinacoteca?” (the “sea” there is how people from Ceará play with the way they say “mas”).

The invitation to visit the brand new Pinacoteca do Ceará seemed quite unusual to me. How did I not know that Fortaleza had such a space, opened in December 2022?

It so happens that, I admit my guilt here, this is not the first association that we make when we think of the capital of Ceará. Yes, the glorious Dragão do Mar has been a beacon of culture in the city for years. Yes, galleries like Multiarte and Leonardo Leal have always been strong references in this area.

But because of a tourist tic, we travelers have a certain difficulty in redefining the characteristics of certain destinations, cities, even more of those we love. That’s why I was so happy to “discover” this Pinacoteca.

Four exhibitions awaited me there. First I saw a collective called “Negros da Piscina”.

Created for Fotofestival Solar, another art initiative that may surprise you, it brings a Brazil that, according to the presentation text, does not yet exist: “a social and affective landscape in which black, indigenous and transvestite bodies, among many others equally blacks, may have the right to work and rest”.

The worn expression “culture shock” is even shy to describe what I saw. And it was just the beginning. The other three exhibitions are grouped together under the title “Bonito pra Cover”, a delicious and poetic local expression to describe a dark sky.

Within this, it is possible to revisit works that even evoke a rediscovery of two masters: Antonio Bandeira and Aldemir Martins, exhibited in two carefully assembled galleries. But it is in Pavilion 2 that this new art from Ceará explodes.

Curators Lucas Dilacerda, Cecilia Bedê and Herbert Rolim gathered in “Se Arar” more than 130 artists who threw in the face of this visitor in love with Ceará the question: how come you never heard of us?

Of course, the exhibition includes Leonilson, in an unexpected drawing made with colored lamps, as well as the always magical Chico da Silva. But it’s the new names that will take you to another dimension.

The two incredible artists of Terroristas del Amor, with their giant panels. Cotton bags embroidered by Rafael Lima Verde. Insect fragments on Thaís de Campos’ slides. The pictorial conversations of Merremii Karão Jaguaribaras. The wall of messages that Aline Albuquerque (Agitprop) carries on her body through the streets. Marcos Martins’ sticks that suggest a support for all of this.

And a crazy video from a troupe called Carnaval no Inferno!

All this, complementing the space of an old railway station brilliantly rethought by the Portuguese architect José Carvalho Araújo, accompanied by Rian Fontenele, also an architect and director of the Pinacoteca.

My head came out spinning from there. And wanting to go back. For the arts, yes, for the stupendous pleasure of finding such a vibrant scene, which will always renew itself with new exhibitions.

But also for the joy of remembering that a tourism reference can (and should) be plural. For this reason, make plans to go to Fortaleza and visit the Pinacoteca do Ceará. And if you can, go to the beach. Just to change priorities a bit.

PRESENT LINK: Did you like this text? Subscriber can release five free hits of any link per day. Just click the blue F below.