Gersony Silva
Português
English

Critics

Entrelaços

Galeria Colorida is hosting Gersony Silva's first solo exhibition to be held in Lisbon.
She has carefully selected certain series from her recent paintings and objects under the title Entre laços. This term - translating to "between ties" or "inter-ties"- arises from the aesthetic representation of paintings interconnected by "ties" as objects, also referring to ribbon seen as guiding thread; again the term "tie" itself expresses a connection between various elements of a certain context. By extrapolating from the aesthetic and grammatical context, one may also expand the universe of this exhibition to the "ties" between Portugal and Brazil, in the sense of the shared political relations in the history of the two countries since the 1500s.
Rather than being restricted to political issues or grammatical terms, Gersony has focused her work on specific pictorial elements - well-honed color choices, creating motion in series, play on light and dark, and overlapping layers. The latter features recall Baroque artifices in their creating a certain depth revealed by the layers that all but hover over the support.
Her painting uses few elements but is not yet pure abstraction. Clearly visible in both series, Dobras em Vermelho and Dobras em Azul, is an upper surface of monochromatic shades of red or blue over an initial layer immersed in a dark tone in allusion to black. The use of primary blue and red makes for a starker contrast between hot and cold colors, on top of its own symbolism. In many cultures, blue is a sacred color related to eternity, or the infinity of the sky, or deep oceans. Although the colors contrast, red also involves magical powers since it refers to vitality, blood and fertility, and so to eternal life. Whereas the black discreetly shown at the top of the paintings would be an allusion to chaos, emptiness, or even death. However, Gersony covers over this dark context with her bright monochrome layers, with a drape-like fall embracing and caressing the works created.
Although all the paintings are individual works, the dialogue of the series creates a subtle rhythm, like scenes from a film. Images produced by filmmakers differ from those created by visual artists, particularly in terms of how the author proceeds. Since the painting is an original, it proceeds to multiply or continue its "idea" through slight nuances in each painting of the set. On this basis, Gersony emphasizes her introspective course through motion examined, re-examined and matured without wasting a single gesture. Her maturity was attained through the execution of preceding works such as the 2007 series Objetos Fendidos – Movimento em Azul and Objetos Fendidos – Movimento em Vermelho, soft-foam objects in monochrome tones, placed in deep frames as if in a reliquary. This object is wholly referential in relation to Gersony's current painting: color choices, painterly gesture, creation of perspective, interplay between internal and external layers ... Ultimately, Gersony's painting is in itself a replica of these objects offering proof of her pictorial mastery.
Gersony's aesthetic values and artistic detachment are derived from a wide-ranging freedom of expression as she moves across different supports representing her universe. Contemporary art poses no restrictions on free movement of artists using different techniques and materials at the same time. Thus Gersony develops further by expanding the Objetos Fendidos series to the field of sculpture. Emerging in the same period were O outro lado – Objeto Arte , a monumental reproduction of Objetos Fendidos unfolding in space, freely cultivating the absence of conventional support, acting as a self- standing sculpture. The resources deployed for her creative work are consciously limited to a few materials, such as the usual soft foam held by plates of glass as a support to expand the magnitude of the curves, inroads, and shapes. There is visible aesthetic correspondence with other works mentioned here. Gersony's aesthetics inhabits her creations simultaneously in full correspondence. The German philosopher Reinhard Knodt has argued that aesthetic correspondence may be silent. Its voice is the relationship between its component parts - nature, natural beauty, or other references and resemblances - that indicate the main intention in the context of aesthetic correspondence.
In addition to its character as object and installation, O Outro Lado – Objeto Arte alludes to an architectural construction to be inhabited and experienced. Its inviting and flexible forms recall the paintings Dobras em vemelho and Dobras em Azul, whose upper-surface edges unfold exposing their interiors. The motion mentioned here resembles the "plastic" architectural style cultivated in the 1920s: shunning rationalism and its cubes, the latest international trends of the period instead featured internal and external "plastic" forms charged with motion, which were labeled "neo-expressionist" buildings. One example was the Le Corbusier church Notre Dame du Haut, built 1950-55.
Visitors participate in the interactive installation Qual é a sua onda by recomposing drawings using Velcro tape. Again, there is malleable material, and monochrome blue is used as a point of departure for infinite but unique dialogues. The composition creates a panel that at first glance resembles dark lettering, but turns out to be merely a relief in the process of being created as a mosaic. This work could be named "Dialogue with Athos Bulcão" as a tribute to "the artist of Brasilia", who designed many murals, mosaics and stained glass windows for Brasilia, made for sharing with the population of the new capital while it was still in its planning stage. Humanity lives off realizing the utopia of creating the "New", devised by restless artists tirelessly and constantly pushing its boundaries: "It is precisely this succession of generations that lends the artistic phenomenon the mark of its continuity through all periods of history, seemingly showing that Man can always yield testimony of his grandeur, even in the most baneful episodes of his short time on earth."
TEREZA DE ARRUDA
Curator - Berlin, September 2009