Ivan Freitas (João Pessoa PB 1932 - Rio de Janeiro RJ 2006)
Ivan Freitas was a painter and muralist. He began his artistic activity self-taught, in João Pessoa, where he held his first solo exhibition at the Biblioteca Pública in 1957. In 1962, he traveled to Paris on a scholarship from the Maison de France. The following year, he returned to Brazil and presented the exhibition Ivan Freitas: Paris 1963 at the Galeria Barcinski in Rio de Janeiro. In 1968, the magazine Galeria de Arte Moderna (GAM) published an article entitled Ivan Freitas e o Espaço Cósmico [Ivan Freitas and Cosmic Space]. Between 1969 and 1972, he was in New York, commissioned by the International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation. Back in Brazil, in 1984 he took part in the first Arte nos Muros [Art on the Walls] project, painting a mural on the outer wall of the Escola Nacional de Música in Rio de Janeiro.
Critiques
"The positive elements of Freitas's painting lie in the structure of the image, ordered and bound by a strict commitment to style, and in the harmony between lines and colors, clearly expressed in terms of 'concentrated poetry'... The young Freitas rejects the randomness of material effect and automatic gesture. He controls and masters every part of the painting with a will to deepen the image that surprises and delights. It is a strange fascination that borders on mystery. Nature mingles with the history of an ancient time, relived across the centuries. Freitas knows how to read in the most mysterious signs the hidden language of pauses and rhythms, of motifs and cadences, within the magic of a colorful atmosphere that adds a restless fascination to the elegance of those secret structures. Freitas defines the 'enigmas'. And rightly so. The beautiful, confident rational constructions of Humanism are replaced by the enigmatic adventures of the spirit. (...) Today the young Brazilian arrives to restate for us, in his own way, Klee's discourse, with an astonishing assurance, with a rare ease of research that brings him close to origins unknown to us yet which we feel to be shared, strangely near."
Giuseppe Marchiori
CAVALCANTI, Carlos (org.); AYALA, Walmir (org.). Dicionário brasileiro de artistas plásticos - D - L. Brasília: MEC: INL, 1973. v. 2, pt. 1, il. p&b. (Dicionário especializado, 5).
"The key crossroads in the nearly 20-year path that makes up Ivan Freitas's work was his stay in New York from 1970 to 1972. If before the trip, following a phase of abstraction close to the informal, his painting already showed a willingness to engage with the high civilization of the machine, the appeal of technology only won him over for good during and after his direct experience of the American metropolis. (...) From then on, what interests him above all is the machine itself, the mechanisms of movement he uses in kinetic constructions with small motors hidden in boxes, driving light patterns in continuously repeated cycles. (...) Focused on the playful use of light and movement, Ivan Freitas seemed for a time, between 1972 and 1974, to have abandoned painting or set it aside in a less privileged position in his work. More recently, however, painting has regained its predominance, always seeking in the machine a source of visual effects, within the strict limits of an activity - painting - that still aims to be the exclusive result of human action, independent of the machine, while regarding it with attention and wonder."
Roberto Pontual
PONTUAL, Roberto. Arte brasileira contemporânea: Coleção Gilberto Chateaubriand. Tradução Florence Eleanor Irvin, John Knox. Rio de Janeiro: Edições Jornal do Brasil, 1976. 478 p., il. color.
Solo Exhibitions
1957 - João Pessoa PB - Solo, at Biblioteca Pública de João Pessoa
1960 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Ivan Freitas: Painting Exhibitions, at Galeria Penguin
1961 - Salvador BA - Solo, at MAM/BA
1962 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) - Solo, at Galeria Rubbers
1962 - Trieste (Italy) - Solo, at La Cavana Galeria
1962 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Instituto Cultural Brasil-Estados Unidos
1962 - Montevideo (Uruguay) - Solo, at Instituto Brasil - Uruguai
1962 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Barcinski
1963 - Naples (Italy) - Solo, at Galleria del Canale
1963 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Ivan Freitas: Paris 1963, at Galeria Barcinski
1964 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Barcinski
1966 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Relevo
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Relevo
1969 - Washington (United States) - Solo, at Pan American Union
1971 - New York (United States) - Solo, at Iramar Gallery
1971 - New York (United States) - Solo, at Bloomingdale's Art Gallery
1973 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Bonino
1973 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Collectio
1974 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Ivan Freitas: Paintings/Objectives, at Bolsa de Arte do Rio de Janeiro
1975 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Arte Global
1976 - São Paulo SP - Ivan Freitas: Paintings/Space/Movement, at Galeria Ipanema
1977 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Paulo Prado
1978 - João Pessoa PB - Solo, at Fundação Cultural do Estado da Paraíba
1979 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria B. 75 Concorde
1980 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria do Sesi
1980 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Paulo Prado
1986 - São Paulo SP - Ivan Freitas: The Reinvented Landscape, at Galeria Arte Aplicada
1987 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Arte Aplicada
1989 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Evasion Arte
1994 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria GB Arte
Group Exhibitions
1959 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 8th National Salon of Modern Art
1960 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 9th National Salon of Modern Art
1961 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 10th National Salon of Modern Art - jury exemption and critics' prize
1961 - São Paulo SP - 6th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Pavilhão Ciccillo Matarazzo Sobrinho
1963 - Europe - Art of America and Spain
1963 - Paris (France) - 2nd Youth Biennial
1963 - São Paulo SP - 7th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1964 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 2nd Jornal do Brasil Art Summary, at MAM/RJ
1965 - Bonn (Germany) - Current Brazilian Art
1965 - London (England) - Current Brazilian Art
1965 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 1st Esso Salon of Young Artists, at MAM/RJ
1965 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Opinião 65, at MAM/RJ
1965 - São Paulo SP - 1st Esso Salon of Young Artists, at MAC/USP
1965 - São Paulo SP - 8th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1965 - Vienna (Austria) - Current Brazilian Art
1966 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) - 5 Contemporary Painters from Brazil
1966 - Montevideo (Uruguay) - 5 Contemporary Painters from Brazil
1966 - Salvador BA - 1st National Visual Arts Biennial
1967 - São Paulo SP - 9th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 2nd Esso Salon of Young Artists, at MAM/RJ
1969 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 7th JB Art Summary, at MAM/RJ
1970 - Medellín (Colombia) - 2nd Coltejer Biennial
1972 - São Paulo SP - Art/Brazil/Today: 50 Years Later, at Galeria Collectio
1973 - São Paulo SP - 12th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1973 - São Paulo SP - 5th Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1974 - São Paulo SP - National Biennial 74, at Fundação Bienal
1975 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Communication According to Visual Artists
1975 - São Paulo SP - 13th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1976 - São Paulo SP - 8th Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1979 - São Paulo SP - 11th Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1979 - São Paulo SP - 15th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, at Fundação Bienal
1982 - Lisbon (Portugal) - Brazil 60 Years of Modern Art: Gilberto Chateaubriand Collection, at Centro de Arte Moderna José de Azeredo Perdigão
1982 - London (England) - Brazil 60 Years of Modern Art: Gilberto Chateaubriand Collection, at Barbican Art Gallery
1984 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Active Brazilian Painting, at Espaço Petrobras
1985 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Opinião 65, at Galeria de Arte Banerj
1986 - Fortaleza CE - Imagine: The Planet Greets the Comet, at Arte Galeria
1986 - São Paulo SP - 17th Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1987 - São Paulo SP - 20th Contemporary Art Exhibition, at Chapel Art Show
1990 - João Pessoa PB - 2nd Current Art from Paraíba, at Fundação Espaço Cultural da Paraíba - guest artist
1992 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - EcoArt, at MAM/RJ
1995 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Opinião 65: 30 Years, at CCBB
2003 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Brazilianart Project, at Almacén Galeria de Arte
Source: Itaú Cultural
