Geraldo Teles de Oliveira (Itapecerica MG 1913 - Divinópolis MG 2006)
Geraldo Teles de Oliveira, better known as GTO, was a renowned Brazilian sculptor and woodcarver. Born into a humble family, GTO held various jobs before devoting himself to sculpture, such as farmworker, foundry worker and night watchman. His first solo exhibition took place in 1967 at the Galeria Guignard in Belo Horizonte. From then on he took part in important group exhibitions in Brazil and abroad, including the Biennale Formes Humaines at the Musée Rodin in Paris in 1974, the 13th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo - Special Room in 1975, and the Venice Biennale, Italy, in 1980.
The artist addressed regional themes, such as religious festivals and traditional dances of the interior of Minas Gerais. His work was the subject of the book Mitopoética de 9 Artistas Brasileiros [Mythopoetics of 9 Brazilian Artists] by Lélia Coelho Frota, 1978, and of films such as A Árvore dos Sonhos [The Tree of Dreams] by Carlos Augusto Calil, produced for the 42nd Venice Biennale. In 1995 the retrospective Cinco Anos sem Novos Sonhos de GTO [Five Years without New Dreams from GTO] was held in Belo Horizonte. His work continued to be shown in important group exhibitions, such as Arte Popular: Mostra do Redescobrimento [Popular Art: Rediscovery Exhibition] (2000) and Pop Brasil: Arte Popular e o Popular na Arte [Pop Brasil: Popular Art and the Popular in Art] (2002).
Critical Commentary
GTO, as the sculptor Geraldo Teles de Oliveira prefers to be known, comes from a poor family. While working as a night watchman, the artist had visions in which the sculptures he was to make were shown to him. As the critic Roberto Pontual notes, without ever having made any sculpture, the artist began, around 1965, to hew large pieces of wood.
He regularly uses red cedar, yellow maçaranduba and vinhático wood. In his works he starts from the human figure, used schematically and repeatedly within geometric structures such as the rectangle and the circle. Frequently using chisel and penknife, he carves the wood with energy and precision. He creates surprising effects, exploring solids and voids and the rhythm given by the succession of figures in his works.
The figures often have popular features and clothing and also recall ex-votos. They are used to fill the entire interior of pieces such as the magic wheels or mandalas the artist calls Rodas-Vivas [Living Wheels]. Again according to Pontual, in his sculptural blocks GTO combines the record of popular sources with the emergence of archetypes of the collective unconscious.
In his sculptures the artist addresses a variety of themes, such as the religious festivals and dances of the interior of Minas Gerais. GTO is the forerunner of a style and practice of wood sculpture later taken up by a whole series of artists working in the Divinópolis region of Minas Gerais. As Pontual further notes, his late production undergoes inevitable simplifications, with an attenuation of the complexity of its symbolic register.
Critiques
"GTO's whole attitude and work reveal a typically magical involvement with reality, exemplifying very precisely the mechanics of archaic behavior. Without ever having made a piece of sculpture before, around 1965 he began to hew large blocks of wood in order to give concrete form to an irrepressible need for expression. For some time before, he had been experiencing nocturnal visions that tormented him, especially while working as a watchman at a hospital in Divinópolis; to these visions were added daydreams, until, during one of them, he saw himself sculpting, which he took as a supernatural order compelling him to seek wood and some rough tools at once and begin his task as artist-intermediary.
The most evident constant in his pieces - in which, curiously, we find a similarity to black African sculpture, especially that of the Bamileke of the Republic of Cameroon - is the dreamlike element, involving the accumulation of figures upon figures or the syncopated movement of crank-operated moving toys".
Roberto Pontual
PONTUAL, Roberto. Arte/Brasil/hoje: 50 anos depois. p. 179.
"The chain is a frequent presence, linking men to one another or to the central blocks of wood. On the door of his house, on Rua Rubim in Divinópolis, we see his portrait in the round, half-length, carved and painted. He portrayed himself with long hair, which he does in fact wear, and a beard, in the Oriental messianic type of Christ. Around his neck is a rope tied with a knot. This figure may be a replica of the martyr Tiradentes, which he made for the mayor of São João del Rei. But it is unmistakably GTO's self-portrait, and his identification with the house, placing it at its entrance, confirms that intention. Curiously, Cirlot and Loffler-Delachaux attribute to the rope, and by extension to the chain, the general symbolic content of binding and connecting (...)"
Lélia Coelho Frota
FROTA, Lélia Coelho. Homem: templo no centro de si mesmo, na roda-viva de G. T. O. In: ---. Mitopoética de 9 artistas brasileiros: vida, verdade e obra. p. 97.
"GTO gives his work this singular perspective, which is at once faith in the craft and in his own ability to create 'beautiful' forms that reflect his astonishment at the world he lives in. In his sculptures he addresses a variety of themes: dances, religious festivals and the whole round of life in the interior of Minas, as well as allegories about events and figures he has heard of and about a great myth: the machine. The sculptor himself says his pieces are 'the portrait of the things I dreamed of'. He dreams of demons and wild beasts, war, the apocalypse, death; he can only explain his nightmares through the images he carves. One of the essential qualities of his sculpture is sincerity. In his simplicity and naivety, he can count himself among the chosen, those who allowed themselves to be possessed by the sacred fire; an interpreter of 'the will of God', he transposes His will to the earthly plane, making it his highest inspiration".
Márcio Sampaio
SAMPAIO, Márcio. In: Salão Global de Inverno, 6. [Catálogo]. n. p.
Solo Exhibitions
1967 - Belo Horizonte MG - Solo, at Galeria Guignard
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria do Copacabana Palace
1987 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - GTO: Twenty Years of Dreams, at Museu Histórico
1987 - Divinópolis MG - GTO: Twenty Years of Dreams, at Museu Histórico
Group Exhibitions
1968 - Belo Horizonte MG - Naïve Art
1969 - Belo Horizonte MG - 1st Contemporary Art Salon
1969 - São Paulo SP - 10th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1970 - Belo Horizonte MG - 2nd Contemporary Art Salon - acquisition prize
1970 - Belo Horizonte MG - The Evolution of Art in Minas, at Palácio das Artes
1970 - São Paulo SP - São Paulo Pre-Biennial, at Fundação Bienal
1972 - São Paulo SP - Art/Brazil/Today: 50 Years Later, at Galeria da Collectio
1973 - Brussels (Belgium) - Brasil Export 73
1974 - Paris (France) - Biennale Formes Humaines, at Musée Rodin
1974 - Paris (France) - Group show, at Galeria Iemanjá
1974 - Paris (France) - Group show, at Galeria Montparnasse
1975 - São Paulo SP - 13th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1977 - Belo Horizonte MG - 5th Global Winter Salon, at Fundação Palácio das Artes
1977 - Brasília DF - 5th Global Winter Salon
1977 - Lagos (Nigeria) - 2nd World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture
1977 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 5th Global Winter Salon, at MNBA
1977 - São Paulo SP - 5th Global Winter Salon, at Masp
1978 - Belo Horizonte MG - 1st Visual Arts Salon of the State Council of Culture, at Palácio das Artes
1978 - Venice (Italy) - 42nd Venice Biennale
1979 - Belo Horizonte MG - 6th Global Winter Salon, at Fundação Clóvis Salgado. Companhia de Dança de Minas Gerais
1979 - São Paulo SP - Latin American Biennial Myths and Magic
1981 - Belo Horizonte MG - 8th Global Winter Salon, at Fundação Palácio das Artes
1981 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 8th Global Winter Salon, at MAM/RJ
1981 - São Paulo SP - 16th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1981 - São Paulo SP - 8th Global Winter Salon, at MAM/SP
1982 - São Paulo SP - A Century of Sculpture in Brazil, at Masp
1984 - Belo Horizonte MG - 1st Fundação Clóvis Salgado Visual Arts Salon, at Fundação Clóvis Salgado. Palácio das Artes
1985 - São Paulo SP - Art Brut, at hall do Cine Metrópole Gaumont
1986 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Art in Wood, at Museu do Folclore
1987 - Belo Horizonte MG - 1st Madeira à Moda Mineira [Wood, Minas Style], at Galeria Trem de Minas
1988 - Belo Horizonte MG - 2nd Madeira à Moda Mineira [Wood, Minas Style], at Galeria Trem de Minas
1990 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Exhibition sponsored by Companhia Vale do Rio Doce
Posthumous Exhibitions
1993 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Brazil: 100 Years of Modern Art, at MNBA
1995 - Belo Horizonte MG - Heirs of the Night: Fragments of the Black Imaginary, at Centro de Cultura de Belo Horizonte
1995 - Belo Horizonte MG - Five Years without New Dreams from GTO, at Galeria Paulo Campos Guimarães
2001 - New York (United States) - Brazil: Body and Soul, at Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
2001 - São Paulo SP - Popular Expression, at Centro Cultural Light
2002 - São Paulo SP - Pop Brasil: Popular Art and the Popular in Art, at CCBB
2004 - São Paulo SP - Form, Color and Expression: A Collection of Brazilian Art, at Estação São Paulo
2004 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Brazil: 100 Years of Modern Art, at MNBA
Source: Itaú Cultural
