Itu, Brasil
19/10/2024 - 19/01/2025

Deslinde & Diversionism — Laerte Ramos

DAN Acredita Project — São Pedro Room

Opening on October 19 at 11 am

Laerte Ramos’s solo show will take place starting October 19 at DAN Sala São Pedro, in Itu. Curated by Carol Splendore, Deslinde & Diversionismo proposes an active dialogue between the spectator and the space, two acts of exhibition, and two

curatorial excerpts.

The artist stands out in the Brazilian contemporary art scene, especially for his engraving and large ceramic installations. He works with woodcut, serigraphy, painting, sculpture, tapestry, using techniques and materials that

challenge him as a tireless artist-researcher.

Through controlled but spontaneous manipulation, he constructs objects that appear to have survived both the catastrophe and the celebration. They become artifacts of alternative realities, relics that connect eras with a simultaneous sense

of permanence and fragility.

According to the curator, “Deslinde” brings together the meeting point between trait and territory, in a continuous process of unveiling and settling, as in the works Retroland and Omen: the initial layer — a beginning of the world — is exposed in its essence. In “Diversionism”, on the other hand, the game of forms becomes subversive. Laerte, with his peculiar ability, reconfigures objects and symbols, tracing deviations on unforeseen paths. Here, in Anti-slip and Seven Boys Patrol, playfulness not only deconstructs the original function, but also reimagines it, transforming the familiar into the unusual

.

Presented series:

Retroland

A series where the artist recalls his drawings developed during his residence in Paris at the Cité dês Arts [@citedesartsparis + @residenciaartisticafaap] in 2001. During this six-month residency, Laerte develops a book with 1650 drawings — a challenge of “10 drawings a day”. These designs, already two decades in production, were transformed into laser engravings on acrylic sheets that are superimposed with a distance on wooden plates painted by Laerte. The paintings in his production are always in the background. The choice of wood as a support is a reference to his matrices, from the time he worked assiduously with woodcut at the beginning of his career. The themes and colors of the paintings in the “Retroland” series are developed with extreme freedom by Laerte, who finds a place where his paintings, drawings and engravings come together to form an “object painting”. The translucent engraving in the foreground also generates a shadow depending on the ambient light that is projected onto the painting, in the background. This is an important fact for the artist, who always observes his painting production in the shadow of his engravings

.

In these paintings, Laerte uses references such as the backgrounds of his grandfather’s paintings (who started painting at the age of 80), cards for learning paintings that were sold on Rua Major Sertorio on Sundays (now extinct), cartoon backgrounds (Pápa Leguas, Pica Pau, Pantera Cor de Rosa, etc.) and comics such as (Groo The Wanderer, Asterix & Obelix, Tex, etc.). The stains and watery as the backgrounds of his paintings are the water-soluble ink he uses – allowing his dirty brushes to be washed in a pot of low water, allowing the fusion of numerous colors, revealing shallow and washed pigment solutions, with the memory of previous paintings that are reprojected onto the new ones. This movement to recover the memories of other works and series is common in his research, and may become clearer when he uses clay, builds a sculpture, makes the mold, and reuses the same clay in a recycled way to build new sculptures in a continuous cycle

.

Retrocremeland:

Work composed of thirteen ceramic sculptures (x4 sets) in hybrid forms of mountains with snow tops and climbering/mountaineering grips. These sculptures are based on other series such as “Topecreme Mountains”, “Agarras Topecreme” and “Big Mama” — which were initially inspired by the Kibon ice cream frosting package, a clear reference to the mass culture and graphic design that formed the aesthetic landscape of the 1980s and his personal taste for climbing adolescence

.

Top-O-Land:

It is very common and recurring in Laerte Ramos’s work that an old series serves as a reference or starting point for new works. In this new set called “Top-o-Lândia” — 2023, Laerte explores an unprecedented connection point between techniques and series. Focusing on the subject of “retrolandic” paintings, with respect for aesthetics, colors and themes, he uses cement to create three-dimensional support for his paintings that are suspended — as well as his sculptures from the 2014 “Casamata” series, which conquered the octagon of the Pinacoteca de São Paulo. The cement blocks are colored in color and float like topographic layers suspended by colored steel cables. Small ceramic sculptures glazed in white are supported by these structures, sculptures relating

the duality of matter.

Versus:

The installation that lends the title to this exhibition, “Versus”, features weapons with their barrel tips blown out, organized in pairs, positioned one facing the other. The explosion that culminates in the cracked cylinders causes a mutual impact. Cause X consequence, reality X imagination, childhood X maturity, drawings X images, games X

wars.

This series does not seek to deal with opposites or contrasts, it is placed as the space between the conflict. In this place of encounters and infinite possibilities, crossroads arise between the experiences of those who tell and those who interpret the visual verses presented in sculptures, tapestries

and lenticular prints.

The reduction of traces and details of planes, explosions, submarines, and tanks creates frozen scenes, paralyzes the place between playful wars and the truths we experience in the world. In a space where anything can happen, including absolutely nothing, playfulness faces reality without the possibility of value judgment. It’s how it is, or more, it’s how it could be. There the narratives form a chorus. From dots, a verse.

The artist tells stories uniting parts – pixels, atoms, lines – to do this, he uses a vocabulary that we can read, the images. Laerte Ramos writes sentences with pictures. He finds in the references from his childhood the accessible ways to generate debates on contemporary political-social issues. It proposes simplified iconography for complex themes, which awaken a connection with the viewer’s references. The place of exchange with those who read your poems is important

.

When a motive comes to your mind, you seek, almost as a challenge, to bring new languages to the story you are going to tell or retell from another point of view. This is how you develop a loom in the exact dimensions to produce your tapestries or sew the piece Nós do Caos — Tapestry by hand

.

Researcher Ana Carla Soler notes, “Elaine de Kooning suggests that an artist always returns to things, they reappear again and again. In “Versus”, Laerte creates his own habitable environment that confronts us with stories that don’t separate past, present and future, because they happen again. They are vestiges of the past in the present to be read in the future”.

About Dan Acredita

This project aims to give visibility to the professional artistic production of artists without representation from other galleries. As it is a tradition at DAN to value artists’ careers, the idea is to bring in professionals with a constantly developing curriculum that are dedicated exclusively to the visual arts and yet still need visibility compatible with their consistent production. The technical rigor of the production of these artists is an essential element in the evaluation and selection of those selected. For 18 months, DAN undertakes to present the artist’s work to as many buyers, collectors, advisors, curators and people connected to the visual arts; to hold a group or individual exhibition at the DAN Galeria Sala São Pedro unit; to carry out institutional monitoring when necessary; publishing on the gallery’s social networks and following the production of the

works.

Service:

Deslinde & Diversionism — Laerte Ramos

Curated by Carolina Splendore

From October 19, 2024 to January 19, 2025

DAN São Pedro Room Gallery (FAMA ITU Museum)

Bartolomeu Tadei Street 09 Alto, Itu SP

Hours: Wednesday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Phone (15) 99136 0301

dangaleria.com.br