Julio Plaza (Madrid, Spain 1938 - São Paulo SP 2003)
Intermedia artist, writer, recorder and teacher.
Julio Plaza González He began his artistic training in the 1950s, with free studies in Madrid. He later attended the École de Beaux-Arts [Escola de Belas Artes], in Paris. He came to Brazil in 1967, integrating the Spanish representation that participates in the 9th International Biennial of São Paulo. He joined the Higher School of Industrial Design - ESDI, in Rio de Janeiro, with a scholarship granted by Itamaraty. He teaches visual language and visual arts, as a resident artist, in the Humanities Department of the Universidad de Puerto Rico, between 1969 and 1973. Then he moves to São Paulo, where he becomes a professor at the School of Communications and Arts at the University of São Paulo - ECA/USP and the Armando Álvares Penteado Foundation - FAAP. In 1975, he published with Augusto de Campos (1931) the books Caixa Preta and Poemóbiles. In 1978, he founded the Aster Visual Arts Center, with Donato Ferrari (1933), Walter Zanini (1925) and Regina Silveira (1939), with whom he was married. In 1985, he completed a PhD in Semiotics from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo - PUC/SP. In the 1990s, he taught at the Department of Multimedia at the Institute of Arts at Unicamp. He is the author of theoretical publications on art, such as videography videography, 1986, and the creative processes with electronic media: digital poetics, with Monica Tavares, 1998. He teaches a course on interactions between image and text, at Itaú Cultural, in 2001.
Critical Comment
Julio Plaza began his studies in the arts in 1957, in Madrid, continuing them in Germany and France. He came to Brazil in 1967, integrating the Spanish representation that participates in the 11th International Biennial of São Paulo, presenting works that dialogue with the constructive aspect, such as, for example, Programmed Modular Elements, s.d. or cubes programmed from the vertex (open work), s.d.. is definitively established in Brazil in 1973, when, already married to the artist Regina Silveira (1939), and after an internship as a teacher at the University of Puerto Rico, responds to the invitation of Professor Walter Zanini (1925) to teach at Fundação Armando Álvares Penteado - FAAP and also at the School of Communications and Arts of the University of São Paulo - ECA/USP.
The artist becomes an acquaintance and Outstanding multimedia artist and graphic designer. In São Paulo, he publishes his first book-object, whose leaves are articulated through folding, becoming three-dimensional. In the following years, he carried out other works of similar tendency, such as, for example, Poemobiles, 1966, with Augusto de Campos (1931) or books by an artist such as Re-Duchamp, 1976, with the same author. He has a great role in the promotion and dissemination of the artistic production of the vanguard, such as the creation of the Aster Visual Arts Center, together with Regina Silveira, Donato Ferrari (1933) and Walter Zanini. Participates in the organization of the Prospective Exhibitions 74 and Visual Poetics (1977), at the Museum of Contemporary Art of the University of São Paulo - MAC/USP, whose main objective is to present the broad integration of artists to the new mass media.
Critiques
"Here is a popular painting (destined to a mass audience), consumable, to some extent naive (because it does not propose traps), sexy and glamorous (depending on who sees it). Even with such characteristics, the work of Sérgio Romagnolo It does not match Richard Hamilton's definition of Pop Art, as it may seem at first sight. To be a pop, each of these pieces should be mass-produced, referring to the business scale, dealing with short-term and cheap solutions, addressing youth exclusively and, essentially, provoking humor. It is true, however, that, in the formation of this young artist from São Paulo, contemporaries of por art - such as Nelson Leirner and Julio Plaza - were the determining pivot for his personal reflection on the visual arts. It all really started with the exhibition 'Pintura Como Meio' (1983), which has already revealed talented names such as Leda Catunda and Ana Maria Tavares. From that moment on, he blew a new breath on the art circuit. Producing a non-mymetric or properly gestural figuration, the boldness of the intention resided in preventing the painting from becoming a subject, a receptacle of history, the end of the process. If at the time the expression 'conceptual painting' sounded like a bad word, today it is very clear that it is an aesthetic proposal that came to reinvigorate an old and painful issue: that of representation".
Lisette Lagnado
São Paulo International Biennial, 19., 1987. General Catalog. Presentation by Jorge Wilheim. Introduction by Sheila Leirner. The rigor of his neoconstructivist formation and peculiarities typical of minimalist visuality, his work took distance from the system of aesthetic/objectual production, passing to a semiotic/communicative language related to the exploration of a language of strict correspondence between meanings and signifiers. He defends the irreducible values of the image, that is, the non-verbal thinking expressed in it. (...) His work is inserted with great security in the broad and growing international circuit of the poetic visuality that emerged from multimedia".
Walter Zanini
ZANINI, Walter.  Exposition carried out in Belgrade, Julio Plaza and Avatar Moraes. Folha de S. Paulo, August 7, 1977. In : Brazil Bienal 20th Century. 1994. P. 386.
Individual exhibitions
1961 - Mililla (Spain) - Individual, at the Military Casino
1966 - Bilbao (Spain) - Individual, at the Leku-Eder Gallery
1966 - Madrid (Spain) - Individual, at Galeria Neblí
1967 - Bilbao (Spain) - Individual, in the Grises Gallery
1967 ? Pamplona (Spain) - Individual, at the Museo de Navarra
1967 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Individual, at IBEU
1968 - Montevideo (Uruguay) - Individual, at Galeria U
1968- San Juan (Porto Rico) - Individual, at the Universidad de Pueto Rico
1969 - Madrid (Spain) - Individual, at the Seiquer Gallery
1969 - Porto Alegre RS - Individual, at the Galeria do IAB/RS
1972 - San Juan (Porto Rico) - Individual, at Casa del Libro
1973 - Madrid (Spain) - Julio Plaza 69-72: Documents and ideas, in the gallery Seiquer
1974 - Vitória ES - Individual, at the Espírito Santo Cultural Foundation
1975 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) - Individual, at Cayc
1975 - Córdoba (Argentina) - Individual, Museo de Córdoba
1975 - São Paulo SP - Camera Obscura, at MAC/USP
1980 - São Paulo SP - Art as Art, at MAC/USP
1984 - Lisbon (Portugal) - Luz Azul, at Cooperativa Diferença
1992 - Lisbon (Portugal) - Hologramas, at Cooperativa Diferença
1994 - Vila Franca de Xira (Portugal) - Holograms and videopoems, at the Municipal Gallery of Vila Franca de Xira (Portugal) Xira
Collective exhibitions
1960 - Madrid (Spain) - Salón de Mayo de Youth Musicales Españolas
1963 - Madrid (Spain) - Festivals de España
1965 - Madrid (Spain) - Collective, at Galeria Biosca
1966 - Barcelona (Spain) - 10th Salón de Mayo
1966 - Barcelona (Spain) - 5th Dibujo Joan Miró International Award, at the Joan Miró Foundation
1966 - Madrid (Spain) - 2nd Salón de Corrientes Constructivas, at Galeria Bique
1966 - Madrid (Spain) - Alcántara Award, in the Circle of Fine Arts
1967 - Spain - International Rotor of Arts Agreement, Festivales de España
1967 - Madrid (Spain) - Nueva Generación, Sala Amadís
1967 - São Paulo SP - 9th São Paulo International Biennial, at the Bienal Foundation
1968 - Mayagüez (Porto Rico)  - 1st International Exposición Dibujo, at the University of Puerto Rico
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 1st Dibujo International Exposición, at MAM/RJ
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Art in the landfill: a Month of Public Art, at Aterro do Flamengo and in the Japanese Pavilion
1968 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Collective, at Petite Galerie
1969 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) Instituto Torcuato di Tella
1970 - New York (United States) - Art and Latin American Music, at the Center for Interamerican Relations
1971 - Oxford (England) - Concrete Poetry
1971 - Amsterdam (Netherlands) - Concrete Poetry, at Geemente Museum
1971 - Nuremberg (Germany) - Concrete Poetry
1971 - Porto Alegre RS - Creative propositions in the city, at UFRGS/ Institute of Arts
1971 - Stuttgart (Germany) - Concrete Poetry
1971 - Ulster (England) - Concrete Poetry
1972 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 1st Screen Printing Exhibition, at MNBA
1972 - San Juan (Porto Rico) - Creation-Creación, at the University of Puerto Rico
1973 - São Paulo SP - Acquisitions, at MAC/USP
1974 - Amsterdam (Holland) - Visual Poetry International
1974 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) - Brazil 74, in the Cayc
1974 - Montevideo (Uruguay) - Festival de la Postal Creativa, at the gallery U
1974 - Rotterdam (Netherlands) - Visual Poetry International
1974 - São Paulo SP - 8th Young Contemporary Art, at MAC/USP
1974 - São Paulo SP - Prospectiva 74, at MAC/USP
1974 - Utrecht (Netherlands) - Visual Poetry International
1975 - Copenhagen (Denmark) - Art Sistems in Latin America, at the Louisiana Museum
1975 - Krakow (Poland) - International Biennial of Krakow
1975 - Ferrara (Italy) - Systems Art, at Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna
1975 - Paris (France) - Video-art, at Espace Cardin
1975 - São Paulo SP - 70's, at MAC/USP
1975 - São Paulo SP - Panorama da Arte, at the Graphic Arts Office
1975 - Slovenia (Yugoslavia) - Paix-75-30 UN, at the Galerie Slovenj Gradecc
1976 - Antwerp (Belgium) - Small Press Festival, at Galerie Kontakt
1976 - São Paulo SP - 2nd Multimedia, at MAC/USP
1977 - Barcelona (Spain) - Latin-America 76, at Fundació Joan Miró
1977 - Belgrade (Yugoslavia) - Exposition Internationale des Arts Plastiques
1977 - Madrid (Spain) - Nueva Generación, at the Palacio de Velázquez
1977 - Paris (France) - Artist Books, at Galerie Hecate
1977 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Identification of Artist - A Book, at EAV/Parque Lage
1977 - São Paulo SP - Visual Poetics, at MAC/USP
1978 - Amsterdam (Netherlands) - From Booksworks to Mailworks, at Alkmar Municipal Museum
1978 - Amsterdam (Holland) - Printed in Brazil, Other Books An So
1978 - Budapest (Hungary) - Fiat Muveszek Klubja
1978 - São Paulo SP - 1st International Video-Art Meeting of São Paulo, at MIS/SP
1978 - São Paulo SP - Homage to Kasimir Malevich, at the Graphic Arts Office
1978 - São Paulo SP - Artists' Books, at the Graphic Arts Office
1979 - Campina Grande PB - Book as Art, at the Art Museum of the Fundação Universidade Regional do Northeast
1979 - New York (United States) - Contemporary Brazilian Works on Paper: 49 Artists, Nobé Gallery
1979 - São Paulo SP - Gerox: Exhibition of Engravings in Xerox, at Max Pochon Space
1979 - New York (United States) - Contemporary Brazilian Works on Paper: 49 artists, Nobé Gallery
1980 - São Paulo SP - Xerografias, at the Pinacoteca do Estado
1981 - Porto Alegre RS - Brazilian artists of the 60s and 70s in the Rubem Knijnik collection, in the space at Galeria Chaves
1981 - São Paulo SP - contemporary artists Brazilians, at the São Paulo Art Office
1981 - São Paulo SP - 16th São Paulo International Biennial, at Fundação Bienal
1981 - São Paulo SP - photo/idea, at MAC/USP
1981 - São Paulo SP - Heliography Exhibition, at the Pinacoteca do Estado
1982 - Caxias do Sul RS - Artemicro, at the University of Caxias do Sul
1982 - Coimbra (Portugal) - Artemicro, in the circle of the Plastic Arts
1982 - La Plata (Argentina) - Libros de Artistas, at the Museo Provincial de Bellas Artes
1982 - Lisbon (Portugal) ? Artemicro, at Cooperativa Diferença
1982 - Madrid (Spain) - Artists Libros, at Salas Pablo Ruiz Picasso
1982 - Rio de Janeiro RJ ? Artemicro, at MAM/RJ  
1982 - São Paulo SP - Art by phone, at MIS/SP
1982 - São Paulo SP ? Artemicro, at MIS/SP
1982 - São Paulo SP - Incommunicabile/Incommunicable, at MAC/USP 
1983 - Dallas (United States) - Artemicro, Bath House Cultural Center
1983 - Ribeirão Preto SP - Xerografia: Brazilian sampling, at the Campus-USP-Banespa Gallery
1983 - San Juan (Porto Rico) - 6th Bienal de San Juan del Grabado Latin American y del Caribe, at the Puertorriqueña Institute of Culture
1983 - São Paulo SP - Art on the Street
1983 - São Paulo SP * 17th São Paulo International Biennial, at the Bienal
1984 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) - Artist Libros Biennial
1984 - Dallas (United States) - Brasil Works, Bath House Cultural Center
1984 - São Paulo SP - Poesia Evidence, at PUC/SP
1985 - Porto Alegre RS, Curitiba PR - Art by phone, at Margs and at the Curitiba Municipal Library
1985 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Calligraphy and Deeds, at Funarte
1985 - São Paulo SP - Art and Technology, at MAC/USP
1985 - São Paulo SP - Arte Novos Meios/Multimeios: Brasil 70/80, at MAB/FAAP
1985 - São Paulo SP - Mutimeios, at FAAP
1985 - São Paulo SP - Artist Book Trends in Brazil, at CCSP
1985 - São Paulo SP ? Transcreate, at ccsp
1985 - São Paulo SP - Transcriar, at MAC/USP 
1985 - São Paulo SP, Porto (Portugal) - Transcriar, at MAC/USP and At the UNESCO Center
1986 - Fortaleza CE - 1st International Exhibition of Ephemeral Sculptures, at Fundação Demócrito Rocha
1986 - Fortaleza CE - Imagine: the planet salutes the comet, in the art gallery
1986 - Porto Alegre RS - Paths of Brazilian Design, at Margs
1986 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Brasil High Tech, at the Centro Arte Empresarial Center
1986 - São Paulo SP - The turn of the century, at the Pinacoteca do State
1986 - São Paulo SP - Triluz, at MIS/SP
1987 - Brasília DF - 1st Latin American Research Exhibition in Arts
1987 - Lisbon (Portugal) ? Idehology, at the Gulbenkian Museum of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation
1987 - São Paulo SP - The plot of taste: another look at everyday life, at the Bienal Foundation
1987 - São Paulo SP - Energy and Art, FOUNDATION MUSEUM OF TECHNOLOGY
1987 - SÃO PAULO SP - PHOTO/IDEIA, AT MAC/USP 
1987 - SÃO PAULO SP - IDEHOLOGIA, AT MAC/USP
1987 - SÃO PAULO SP - Word Imágica, at MAC/USP
1988 - Lisbon (Portugal) - Triluz, at Cooperativa Diferença
1988 - São Paulo SP - 13th Salão de Arte Contemporânea de Campinas, at MACC
1989 - Madrid (Spain) - Geometric Trends in España: 1957-1989, at the Centro Cultural de la Villa
1991 - Asturias (Spain) - Fiat Lux, in the Caja de Ahorros de Asturias
1991 - Gijón (Spain) - Fiat Lux, at Caja de Ahorros de Asturias
1991 - São Paulo SP - 2nd International Studio of Image Technology, at SESC Pompéia
1991 - São Paulo SP - Homage to Avenida Paulista, at Galeria Sesc Paulista - APCA Communication Art Award
1992 - Alicante (Spain) - Entorn Holografia, at the Cultural Center d'Alcoi
1992 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Atlantic retrospective of the independent video, at the Cândido Mendes Association
1993 - Florence (Italy) - Brazil: Segni d'Art, at the Nazionale Centrale Library Di Firenze
1993 - Milan (Italy) - Brazil: Segni d'Arte, at the Nazionale Braidense Library
1993 - Rome (Italia) - Brazil: Segni D'Arte, at the Centro de Estudos Brasileiros
1993 - São Paulo SP - Brazil, small formats, few words, at the Documenta Galeria de Arte
1993 - São Paulo SP - Paraver: Visual Poetry, at Faculdade Santa Marcelina
1993 - Venice (Italy) - Brazil: Segni d'Arte, at Fondazione Scientífica Querini Stampalia
1994 - Belo Horizonte MG - book-poema-objeto, at the Luiz de Bessa
1994 - Belo Horizonte MG - Poetics of Visuality, at Palácio das Artes
1994 - Fortaleza CE - 1st Brazilian Book Fair
1994 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Object book: The frontier of Empty, at CCBB
1994 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - via fax, at the Telephone Museum
1994 - Santo André SP - Plus Poesia: Contemporary Poetry Exhibition, at Porto Cultural Entrepost
1994 - São Paulo SP - Bienal Brasil Século 20th Century, at the Bienal Foundation
1995 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Electronic Art Exhibition of the National Virtual Reality Bank, at the CCCM
1995 - São Paulo SP - Art in the 21st Century: Humanization of Technologies, MAC/USP 
1995 - São Paulo SP - Art in the 21st Century: Humanization of Technologies, at the Memorial Foundation of Latin America
1995 - São Paulo SP - Book-Object: The frontier of the voids, in the MAM/SP
1996 - São Paulo SP - Ex Libris/Home Page, at Paço das Artes
1997 - São Paulo SP - 3rd United Artists III: Luz, at Casa das Rosas
1997 - São Paulo SP - The City of Artists, at MAC/USP
1997 - São Paulo SP - Ao Cubo, at Paço das Artes
1998 - São Paulo SP - Os Collectors - Guita and José Mindlin: matrices and engravings, at the Art Gallery of SESI
1999 - São Paulo SP - Cover Aces, at MIS/SP
2000 - New York (United States) - Libros of contemporary artists, at Yale University
2000 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Situations: Brazilian art in the 70s, at Casa França-Brasil
2000 - São Paulo SP - Conceptual Art and Conceptualism: 70's at the MAC/USP collection, at the SESI Art Gallery
2000 - São Paulo SP - The Role of Art, at the SESI Art Gallery
2001 - Belo Horizonte MG - International Poetry Biennial, at the Alto Vera Cruz Culture Center
2001 - Curitiba PR - Videopoems, at Solar do Barão
2001 - Porto Alegre RS - Liba and Rubem Knijnik Collection: Contemporary Brazilian Art, at Margs
2001 - São Paulo SP - Trajectory of Light in Brazilian Art, at Itaú Cultural
2001 - Vila Franca de Xira (Portugal) - Book of Artist, at the Galeria de Alverca
2002 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Caminhos do Contemporânea 1952-2002, at Paço Imperial
2003 - São Paulo SP - MAC USP 40 years: Contemporary interfaces, MAC/USP
Posthumous exhibitions
2003 - Curitiba PR - Imagética, Casa Romário Martins
2003 - São Paulo SP - The subversion of the media, Itaú Cultural
2004 - São Paulo SP - Contemporary Art at the Municipal Collection, São Paulo Cultural Center
2004 - São Paulo SP - São Paulo Icons, Centro Universitário da USP - Maria Antonia
2004 - São Paulo SP - Individual, Centro Universitário Maria Antonia
2004 - São Paulo SP - Individual, Museum of Contemporary Art at USP 
2005 - Chicago (United States) - Tropicália: A Revolution in Brazilian Culture, Museum of Contemporary Art
2005 - São Paulo SP - 60 Post - 60, Centro Cultural São Paulo
2005 - São Paulo SP - Cinetic_digital, Itaú Cultural
2006 - London (United Kingdom) - Tropicália: A revolution in Brazilian Culture, Barbican Art Gallery
2006 - New York (United States) - Tropicália: A Revolution in Brazilian Culture, The Bronx Museum of the Arts
2006 - São Paulo SP - MAM Na Oca, Oca
2007 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Artist Films: Brazil 1965-80, Oi Futuro - Flamengo
2007 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Tropicália: a revolution in culture Brazilian, Museum of Modern Art
2007 - São Paulo SP - 70s - Art as a Question, Tomie Ohtake Institute
2007 - São Paulo SP - Itaú Contemporary: Art in Brazil 1981-2006, Itaú Cultural
2008 - Brasília DF - ObraNome II, National Museum of the Cultural Complex of the Republic
2008 - São Paulo SP - Laços do Olhar, Instituto Tomie Ohtake
2010 - São Paulo SP - Memories Revealed, Museum of Brazilian Art
2010 - São Paulo SP - Tékhne, Brazilian Art Museum
2010 - São Paulo SP - One day you will have to finish: 1969/74, Museum of Contemporary Art of the University of São Paulo
2011 - Brussels (Belgium) - Extreme engraving, Centre de la Gravure et de l'image Imprimée la louvière
2011 - Porto (Portugal) - from page to the Space: published paper sculptures, Serralves Foundation
2011 - Viamão RS - A point of irony, Vera Chaves Barcellos Foundation
2012 - São Paulo SP - Poesia, Virgílio Gallery
2012 - Viamão RS - Julio Plaza, Poetic Constructions, Vera Chaves Barcellos Foundation. Sala Pomares
Source: Itaú Cultural
