HELENA ALMEIDA: MY WORK IS MY BODY, MY BODY IS MY WORK
from 17 OCT 2015 to 10 JAN 2016
‘Helena Almeida: My work is my body, my body is my work’ exhibits the work of renowned Portuguese artist Helena Almeida (Lisbon, 1934), surveying her work in painting, photography, video and drawing over nearly five decades. The exhibition will highlight the importance of the body — registering, occupying and defining space — and its performative encounter with the world throughout Almeida’s work from mid-1960s until today. Along with the artist’s ‘inhabited’ paintings and the photographic series for which she is best known, the exhibition will also feature rarely exhibited work from throughout her artistic career. Through her early abstract painting, Almeida introduces the central concerns that define her artistic practice in a variety of media, in particular an interest in breaking the confines of pictorial and narrative space, which has always played a fundamental role in her work. As Almeida states, ‘my painting is my body, my work is my body’.
To accompany the exhibition, Serralves will publish a catalogue, with separate editions in Portuguese, English and French, which will explore the artist’s working process and the importance of her oeuvre in the context of Portuguese art and feminist and performance-based artistic practices in the 1970s and subsequent decades. The catalogue includes hitherto unpublished essays by Peggy Phelan (Professor of Theatre, Performance and English at Stanford University), Connie Butler (Chief Curator at the Hammer Museum, University of Los Angeles) and Bernardo Pinto de Almeida (historian and art critic, professor at the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto) as well as an interview with the artist by the exhibition’s curators, João Ribas and Marta Moreira de Almeida.
‘Helena Almeida: My work is my body, my body is my work’ is curated by João Ribas, Deputy Director and Senior Curator, and Marta Moreira de Almeida, Head of Exhibitions of the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art.
The exhibition will travel to Jeu de Paume in Paris (Spring 2016) and Wiels, Centre d’art contemporain in Brussels (Fall 2016).
Image: Helena Almeida, Saída negra [Black Exit], 1995 (detail). 5 B/w photographs. 71 x 48 cm (each). Coll. Norlinda and José Lima, on long term loan to Núcleo de Arte da Oliva Creative Factory. Photo: Aníbal Lemos, courtesy Núcleo de Arte da Oliva Creative Factory.
Related Activities OPENING: 16 OCT (FRI), 22H00, FREE ENTRANCE GUIDED TOURS AND WORKSHOPS
25 OCT (SUN), 10h00 Workshop for families HERE MY BODY IS A PAINTING AND DRAWINGBy Cristina Camargo, Museum EducatorMore information here
25 OCT (SUN), 12h00 Guided tour to the exhibitionBy Sónia Borges, Museum Educator
01 NOV (SUN), 10h00 Workshop for families IMAGINARY PAINTINGBy Rita Faustino, Museum EducatorMore information here
05 NOV (QUI), 19h30Exclusive guided tour for members of Amigos de SerralvesBy João Ribas and Marta Moreira de Almeida, curators of the exhibitionMore information here
15 NOV (SUN), 10h00 Workshop for families THREADBARE DRAWINGSBy Raquel Correia and Sónia Borges, Museum EducatorSMore information here
21 NOV (SAT), 10h30 Workshop-tour in Portuguese Sign LanguageBy LAREDO ASSOCIAÇÃO CULTURAL
21 NOV (SAT), 16h30 Guided tour in Portuguese Sign LanguageBy LAREDO ASSOCIAÇÃO CULTURAL
05 DEC (SAT), 17h00 Guided tour to the exhibitionBy João Pedro Vale, artist
06 and 19 DEC (SUN), 10h00-17h00Workshop for families - Christmas at Serralves: ‘Imaginary Painting’By Rita Faustino, Museum Educator
13 DEC (SUN), 12h00 Guided tour to the exhibitionBy Raquel Correia, Museum Educator
10 JAN (SUN), 12h00Exclusive guided tour for members of Amigos de SerralvesBy João Ribas and Marta Moreira de Almeida, curators of the exhibition
CINEMA AND PERFORMANCE
14 NOV 2015 (SAT), 18H00"INHABITED PAINTING" BY JOANA ASCENSÃOA film about the work of Helena Almeida, an artist who, since the late 60’s, has created a body of work in which she explores the limits of self-representation and the frontiers of different media, be it painting, drawing, photography or video. Inhabited Painting focuses on the various elements involved in the elaborate creative process through which Helena Almeida constructs her pieces, from her first studies right up to the exhibition of her finished works.The cinema session will be introduced by the film director, Joana Ascensão.More information here
28 NOV 2015 (SAT), 18h00-19h00LECTURE-PERFORMANCE "I WAS HERE" BY JOÃO FIADEIRO‘I was here’ re-visits the piece 'I am here' created in 2003 and which, in turn, visits the universe of the fine artist Helena Almeida. In this particular piece, João Fiadeiro exposes – through the presentation of films, photos, texts, models, small presentations, etc. – the way how the encounter with Helena Almeida’s work happened; the encounter with Helena Almeida herself; the way how, on its different levels, the displacement between the original affection, the formulation laid down and the work manifestation developed; and the way how the relationship between the several collaborators went through, especially with the visual artist and architect Walter Lauterer, author of the scenography-sculpture that hosts João Fiadeiro body in the piece 'I am here'.More information here
Helena Almeida Helena Almeida was born in Lisbon in 1934. She studied Painting at the Lisbon School of Fine Arts and has been exhibiting her work regularly since the late 1960s. From the very beginning of her career, Almeida has explored and questioned traditional media, particularly painting, constantly seeking to break away from the pictorial plane. The works displayed in her first solo show (Galeria Buchholz, Lisbon, 1967) already revealed a critical exercise on painting: whilst showing that which, in a painting, is supposed to be hidden, the artist investigates the corporeal and the materiality of painting’s traditional support, the canvas. Recent international exhibitions at Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge (2009) Fundación Telefónica, Madrid (2009), The Drawing Centre, New York the Sydney Biennial (2004), and Centro Galego de Arte Contemporanea, Santiago de Compostela (2000), have brought greater recognition of this artist’s significance both in relation to Portuguese art but in a wider international context. Almeida has represented Portugal twice at the Venice Biennial, in 1982 and 2005. Her work is included in a large number of public and private collections both in Portugal and abroad.
Exclusive Sponsor of the Exhibition
To accompany the exhibition, Serralves will publish a catalogue, with separate editions in Portuguese, English and French, which will explore the artist’s working process and the importance of her oeuvre in the context of Portuguese art and feminist and performance-based artistic practices in the 1970s and subsequent decades. The catalogue includes hitherto unpublished essays by Peggy Phelan (Professor of Theatre, Performance and English at Stanford University), Connie Butler (Chief Curator at the Hammer Museum, University of Los Angeles) and Bernardo Pinto de Almeida (historian and art critic, professor at the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto) as well as an interview with the artist by the exhibition’s curators, João Ribas and Marta Moreira de Almeida.
‘Helena Almeida: My work is my body, my body is my work’ is curated by João Ribas, Deputy Director and Senior Curator, and Marta Moreira de Almeida, Head of Exhibitions of the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art.
The exhibition will travel to Jeu de Paume in Paris (Spring 2016) and Wiels, Centre d’art contemporain in Brussels (Fall 2016).
Image: Helena Almeida, Saída negra [Black Exit], 1995 (detail). 5 B/w photographs. 71 x 48 cm (each). Coll. Norlinda and José Lima, on long term loan to Núcleo de Arte da Oliva Creative Factory. Photo: Aníbal Lemos, courtesy Núcleo de Arte da Oliva Creative Factory.
Related Activities OPENING: 16 OCT (FRI), 22H00, FREE ENTRANCE GUIDED TOURS AND WORKSHOPS
25 OCT (SUN), 10h00 Workshop for families HERE MY BODY IS A PAINTING AND DRAWINGBy Cristina Camargo, Museum EducatorMore information here
25 OCT (SUN), 12h00 Guided tour to the exhibitionBy Sónia Borges, Museum Educator
01 NOV (SUN), 10h00 Workshop for families IMAGINARY PAINTINGBy Rita Faustino, Museum EducatorMore information here
05 NOV (QUI), 19h30Exclusive guided tour for members of Amigos de SerralvesBy João Ribas and Marta Moreira de Almeida, curators of the exhibitionMore information here
15 NOV (SUN), 10h00 Workshop for families THREADBARE DRAWINGSBy Raquel Correia and Sónia Borges, Museum EducatorSMore information here
21 NOV (SAT), 10h30 Workshop-tour in Portuguese Sign LanguageBy LAREDO ASSOCIAÇÃO CULTURAL
21 NOV (SAT), 16h30 Guided tour in Portuguese Sign LanguageBy LAREDO ASSOCIAÇÃO CULTURAL
05 DEC (SAT), 17h00 Guided tour to the exhibitionBy João Pedro Vale, artist
06 and 19 DEC (SUN), 10h00-17h00Workshop for families - Christmas at Serralves: ‘Imaginary Painting’By Rita Faustino, Museum Educator
13 DEC (SUN), 12h00 Guided tour to the exhibitionBy Raquel Correia, Museum Educator
10 JAN (SUN), 12h00Exclusive guided tour for members of Amigos de SerralvesBy João Ribas and Marta Moreira de Almeida, curators of the exhibition
CINEMA AND PERFORMANCE
14 NOV 2015 (SAT), 18H00"INHABITED PAINTING" BY JOANA ASCENSÃOA film about the work of Helena Almeida, an artist who, since the late 60’s, has created a body of work in which she explores the limits of self-representation and the frontiers of different media, be it painting, drawing, photography or video. Inhabited Painting focuses on the various elements involved in the elaborate creative process through which Helena Almeida constructs her pieces, from her first studies right up to the exhibition of her finished works.The cinema session will be introduced by the film director, Joana Ascensão.More information here
28 NOV 2015 (SAT), 18h00-19h00LECTURE-PERFORMANCE "I WAS HERE" BY JOÃO FIADEIRO‘I was here’ re-visits the piece 'I am here' created in 2003 and which, in turn, visits the universe of the fine artist Helena Almeida. In this particular piece, João Fiadeiro exposes – through the presentation of films, photos, texts, models, small presentations, etc. – the way how the encounter with Helena Almeida’s work happened; the encounter with Helena Almeida herself; the way how, on its different levels, the displacement between the original affection, the formulation laid down and the work manifestation developed; and the way how the relationship between the several collaborators went through, especially with the visual artist and architect Walter Lauterer, author of the scenography-sculpture that hosts João Fiadeiro body in the piece 'I am here'.More information here
Helena Almeida Helena Almeida was born in Lisbon in 1934. She studied Painting at the Lisbon School of Fine Arts and has been exhibiting her work regularly since the late 1960s. From the very beginning of her career, Almeida has explored and questioned traditional media, particularly painting, constantly seeking to break away from the pictorial plane. The works displayed in her first solo show (Galeria Buchholz, Lisbon, 1967) already revealed a critical exercise on painting: whilst showing that which, in a painting, is supposed to be hidden, the artist investigates the corporeal and the materiality of painting’s traditional support, the canvas. Recent international exhibitions at Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge (2009) Fundación Telefónica, Madrid (2009), The Drawing Centre, New York the Sydney Biennial (2004), and Centro Galego de Arte Contemporanea, Santiago de Compostela (2000), have brought greater recognition of this artist’s significance both in relation to Portuguese art but in a wider international context. Almeida has represented Portugal twice at the Venice Biennial, in 1982 and 2005. Her work is included in a large number of public and private collections both in Portugal and abroad.
Exclusive Sponsor of the Exhibition
