José Tarcísio (Fortaleza CE 1941)
Painter, intermedia artist, printmaker, sculptor, set and costume designer.
José Tarcísio Ramos made his first works of visual art in 1960. The following year, he moved to Rio de Janeiro and attended the studio of Inimá de Paula, as well as studying at the Escola Nacional de Belas Artes from 1964 to 1966. He suffered under the military repression, being jailed for four days and placed under censorship in 1968. In 1970, he created the costumes and props for the play Cemitério de Automóveis [The Car Cemetery], staged at the Teatro Ruth Escobar in São Paulo. In 1976, his work Regando Pedras [Watering Stones] was reproduced on a postage stamp by the Empresa de Correios e Telégrafos.
Critiques
"To live, to blend in. To pass through time, through all the stimuli sketched out. To be, as an artist, a transient and receptive sensitive plant. This is how José Tarcísio, a native of Ceará not yet forty, has made his passage. All who have known him for almost two decades have seen how he has faced the tyranny of schemes, how he has danced with the dragon and polished its scales. (...) The transplant from Fortaleza to Rio, and the memory of the interior, a powerful residue worn by much use, would set in stone the images of the family circle, a source to which he would often return for sustenance (...). In 1971 he traveled to Paris. Needing to earn a living, he decided to draw like any sidewalk artist. His subject matter did not interest buyers, and he adapted to the circumstances. Everyone bought flowers, and he drew flowers. He still keeps these flowers, with secret pride, as if saved from compromise. Critically, we find in these flowers the same level of invention as ever, and in a retrospective they would have to be included. In London, the intensification is sexual (1970s) - what remains are drawings with genital connotations. Details like scientific models, with no hint of sensuality. (...) Then began the humble, arduous apprenticeship of painting. From a trip to Fortaleza he brought back an accumulation of images - beaches, sand flats, scrub (the survival of a stark, harsh nature). The painter's approach balances between the rationality of an elaborate painting and the naïve quality of a chromatic astrakhan, liberties José Tarcísio still and always allows himself".
Walmir Ayala
BIENAL INTERNACIONAL DE SÃO PAULO, 15., 1979. Catálogo geral. Apresentação de Luiz Fernando Rodrigues Alves. São Paulo: Fundação Bienal, 1979.
Solo Exhibitions
1967 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria G4
1968 - Fortaleza CE - Solo, at Galeria Raimundo Cela
1969 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Bonino
1969 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Masp
1979 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Bonino
Group Exhibitions
1962 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Salão Cândido Portinari - honorable mention
c. 1962 - São Paulo SP - Beginners' Salon, at Galeria Prestes Maia - 1st prize
1964 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Enba Students' Salon - 1st prize
1965 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - General Fine Arts Exhibition of the 4th Centenary - 1st prize
1965 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Enba Students' Salon - 1st prize
c. 1965 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - General Visual Arts Salon - foreign travel prize
1966 - Campinas SP - 2nd Contemporary Art Salon
1966 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 15th National Salon of Modern Art
1966 - Salvador BA - 1st National Visual Arts Biennial
1967 - Brasília DF - 4th Federal District Salon of Modern Art
1967 - Campinas SP - 3rd Contemporary Art Salon - encouragement prize
1967 - Campinas SP - 3rd Campinas Contemporary Art Salon, at MACC
1967 - Fortaleza CE - 1st Ceará National Visual Arts Salon - 1st prize in painting
1967 - Ouro Preto MG - 1st Drawing Salon - award winner
1967 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 3rd O Rosto e a Obra [The Face and the Work], at Galeria Ibeu Copacabana
1967 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Nova Objetividade Brasileira [New Brazilian Objectivity], at MAM/RJ
1967 - São Paulo SP - 9th São Paulo International Biennial, at Fundação Bienal - acquisition prize
1968 - Campinas SP - 4th Contemporary Art Salon
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 17th National Salon of Modern Art, at MAM/RJ
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Pintores Cearenses [Painters from Ceará], at MNBA - 3rd prize
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Esso Young Artists Salon, at MAM/RJ
1969 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 18th National Salon of Modern Art
1969 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 1st Transport Salon, at MAM/RJ - acquisition prize
1969 - São Paulo SP - 1st São Paulo Contemporary Art Salon, at Masp
1970 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 19th National Salon of Modern Art
1970 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Group show, at Instituto Cultural Brasil-Estados Unidos
1971 - Paris (France) - 7th Paris Biennale
1971 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 20th National Salon of Modern Art
1971 - São Paulo SP - 5th Young Contemporary Art, at MAC/USP
1972 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 21st National Salon of Modern Art
1972 - São Paulo SP - Art/Brazil/Today: 50 Years Later, at Galeria da Collectio
1973 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 22nd National Salon of Modern Art - domestic travel prize
1974 - Campinas SP - 9th Campinas Contemporary Art Salon, at MACC
1974 - Niterói RJ - 3rd Rio de Janeiro State Visual Arts Show - acquisition prize
1974 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 23rd National Salon of Modern Art - foreign travel prize
1974 - São Paulo SP - National Biennial 74, at Fundação Bienal
1975 - Medellín (Colombia) - Medellín Triennial
1975 - Piracicaba SP - Contemporary Art Salon
1975 - São Paulo SP - 7th Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1975 - São Paulo SP - Novos e Novíssimos Gravadores Brasileiros [New and Newest Brazilian Printmakers], at MAC/USP
1979 - São Paulo SP - 15th São Paulo International Biennial, at Fundação Bienal
1983 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 6th National Visual Arts Salon, at MAM/RJ
1992 - São Paulo SP - Grupo Guanabara: 1950-1959 [Guanabara Group: 1950-1959], at Renato Magalhães Gouvêa Escritório de Arte
1996 - Fortaleza CE - 2nd Norman Rockwell Salon, at Galeria Ibeu
1998 - São Paulo SP - Grupo Seibi: Exposição Comemorativa dos 90 Anos da Imigração Japonesa no Brasil [Seibi Group: Exhibition Celebrating 90 Years of Japanese Immigration to Brazil], at Jo Slaviero Galeria de Arte
1998 - São Paulo SP - São Paulo: The Japanese-Brazilian View, at Museu Lasar Segall
1998 - São Paulo SP - Traços e Formas [Lines and Forms], at Jo Slaviero Galeria de Arte
2002 - São Paulo SP - Pop Brazil: Popular Art and the Popular in Art, at CCBB
Source: Itaú Cultural
