PROJECT ROOM: Cao Guimãraes Photography and video
April 14 – July 3, 2011
An artist from Belo Horizonte, Brazil, Cao Guimãraes’ Project Room exhibition will consist of a selection of recent videos and photography that represent the main themes in his work. He is best known for his photographic series Gambiarras (2002-2007), which portrays how people with limited available resources come up with creative solutions to everyday needs. In Gambiarras people improvise, re-appropriate objects and transform materials to repair, for example, a pair of glasses using wire; replace the use of a spoon with folded aluminum foil to gather bites of food; or use a paper clip to fix a woman’s bra.
Guimarães’ work documents the subtleties of everyday life in city neighborhoods, not with the intention of finding poetic meaning in these details, but because portraying these details is a way of inventorying the meaningful elements of life. The presence of Brazilian art in the Los Angeles area has included modern masters and established representatives of the Brazilian avant-garde movements. MOLAA’s Project Room exhibitions present contemporary artists whose work provides a counterpoint to our main exhibitions, sometimes challenging their concepts and presenting an aesthetic alternative.
Cao Guimãraes (Brazil, 1965) is a filmmaker and visual artist. Since the late 1980s he has been exhibiting at venues such as theTate Modern, London; Guggenheim Museum, New York; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and has participated in various biennials including the XXV and XXVII São Paulo Bienale, Brazil; and inSite_05, San Diego/Tijuana, 2005. Guimãraes’ work has also been included in several film festivals such as Locamo International Film Festival, 2004, 2006, and 2008; Mostra Internazionale d’Arte Cinematografica di Venezia, 2007; Sundance Film Festival, 2007; Cannes Film Festival, 2005; and the Rotterdam International Film Festival, 2005, 2007 and 2008. The artist lives and works in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
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