An introduction to Portugal
As part of the OPW’s ethos of bringing art, in all its forms and guises, from around the world to Ireland, Farmleigh is currently exhibiting a group exhibition called “Now let me introduce you…” by a quartet of current Portuguese artists. The exhibition is produced in a joint venture between Farmleigh Gallery and the Portuguese gallery Graça Brandão Porto/Lisboa.Gonçalo Pena, João Galrão, Miguel Soares and Rui Horta Pereira are four artists currently at the cutting edge of Portuguese art and each of them has forged a reputation internationally. Each works with different media but curator Paulo Reis has chosen carefully and there is a curiously complementary feel to the exhibition which is not always found in group shows.“The artists selected by myself represent a variety of media such as painting, sculpture, drawing, photography and video,” he says. “They are well known in the artistic scene amongst their generation and have each experienced an international career, either at group shows and solo exhibitions. “For me, the project shows a contemporary Portugal through its thematic variety, conceptual and stylistic modern practices. “Although there are significant differences between them – either in the media or in their practices and intentions – the works of these fours artists nevertheless share certain romantic ideals of an interpretation of the story of humanity, because the artist is, after all, the one who invents what nobody asked to invent.”The retro-futuristic work of Miguel Soares derives from the manipulation of the real by the use of digital software. The archaeological future, the present reshaped, the manipulated reality, the altered perceptions of the universe of this artist is the reckoning of what Pierre Lévy will call memory sharing, of perception, of imagination, resulting in a apprenticeship and trade of knowledge between groups. It is Eliot’s time present and time past and represents an intermingling of history and destination.In his world of absurd sensations, painter Gonçalo Pena similarly combines the past and the present. He composes heroic scenes, epic, absurd and almost surreal, drawing from numerous influences but creating a world uniquely his own. There is an almost Dali-esque symbolism about his work as well as more than a nod of the head to the neo-expressionism of Salomé and Kippenberg in his creations.João Galrão is a sculptor who de-constructs to construct. The original shape is de-composed and then bursts forth in organic forms. His wood structures covered with canvas conjugate the historic influence of Arte Povera, many of the pieces of Giulio Paulini and the new British sculpture of Tony Cragg.Rui Horta Pereira drawings resemble the Lilliputian fantastic universe and could be pulled out of the illustrations for a Lewis Carroll book. Perception and illusion intermingle and the natural sits comfortably with the artificial in an interpretation of Goethe’s famous dictum on nature.“Now let me introduce you…” curated by Brazilian art critic and director of Dardo magazine Paulo Reis runs at Farmleigh Gallery until October 19th.Admission during normal Farmleigh opening hours is free. (fonte)