Luiz Hermano (Preaoca CE 1954)
Sculptor, printmaker, draftsman, painter.
In the early 1970s, Luiz Hermano Façanha Farias studied philosophy in Fortaleza and, self-taught, worked with etching and drawing. In 1979, he took printmaking classes with Carlos Martins (1946) at the Escola de Artes Visuais do Parque Lage - EAV/Parque Lage in Rio de Janeiro. That same year, he moved to São Paulo and held the exhibition Desenhos [Drawings] at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand - Masp. In 1984, he received the Chandon Art and Wine Prize, which took him to Paris, where he held a solo exhibition at the Galerie Debret. In 1983, he took part in the 5th Seoul International Biennial and, in 1986, in the 2nd Pan-American Biennial of Havana. In the 1980s, he devoted himself mainly to painting. In the 1990s, he developed three-dimensional works using a variety of materials, including wood, bamboo and copper, aluminum and iron wire. He showed paintings at the 19th São Paulo International Biennial in 1987 and sculptures at the 21st edition in 1991. In 1994, he presented the exhibition Esculturas para Vestir [Sculptures to Wear] at the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo - MAM/SP. He later began working with mass-consumption items, such as plastic toys and cleaning utensils, with which he creates installations, panels and objects.
Critical Commentary
At the start of his career, Luiz Hermano produced drawings and prints in which line is fundamental, presenting surreal-inspired scenes drawn from the imagery of popular prints and cordel literature. Childhood memories and a certain playfulness are also present in both his graphic work and his paintings. He later began producing objects and sculptures in thread-like materials, exploring formal possibilities related to the craft production of utensils from his native state, Ceará, such as weaving, using aluminum, copper, stainless steel or bronze. As the art historian Tadeu Chiarelli notes, the artist uses a precarious, handcrafted mode of production, originating in a pre-industrial world, to create autonomous forms out of industrial materials. It is precisely in this tension that the interest of his work lies. These issues can be seen, for example, in the series of works based on the cube, in which the logic associated with this geometric figure is subverted by structural fragility.
In more recent work, Hermano has appropriated materials different from those used before, such as colored metals, natural gourds and various kinds of plastic toys. He creates open structures, entangled in space, such as the Torres [Towers] (2003), built with plastic rulers, exploring questions of balance and imbalance. As the art critic Maria Alice Milliet also points out, his pieces have a fragility that stems both from the materials and from the construction process he uses.
Critiques
"When Luiz Hermano builds his sculptures, he follows the patterns and inner intelligence of certain pre-existing techniques, such as weaving, basketry and other age-old craft procedures.
Only in a country like Brazil, where industrialization has not broken with the mode of production that preceded it in other nations, would it be fitting to find an artist who, working with industrial materials, revives ancient craft practices with such intensity and such aptness. (...)
Instead of rolling, creasing, folding, twisting and cutting, some Brazilian artists have been sewing, embroidering, linking and gluing hinges between Brazilian vernacular visuality and the major issues of international art in recent decades. This is the context that Luiz Hermano's production occupies. And expands".
Tadeu Chiarelli
Chiarelli, Tadeu. O minimalismo, a arte brasileira, o pós-minimalismo e a produção de Luiz Hermano - mas não necessariamente nessa ordem. Hermano, Luiz. Luiz Hermano. n. p.
"Luiz Hermano's work follows a path marked out by the constructive structures that compose it, by the rhythmic nuances of its unfoldings and repetitions, by the interweaving of light and shadow, by the punctuation of the baroque syntax of its elaborate graphics, by the archaic memory of the artifacts of his native Ceará, and by the vibrant sensuality that punctuates the opulent economy of insistent compositional lines. Combining the elements of this path, the reflection it prompts recovers without nostalgia a craftsmanship from an ideal time that points both to the artist's uprooting and to his insertion in the world. (...)
The dimension of the game played between the whole and the parts, the continuous and the discontinuous, the fragment and the work, brings unity and rigor to the artist's work, giving it a rationality that oscillates between dry assembly and a voluptuous web infiltrated with sensuality. Without losing the coherent organization of the relationships between the parts, the sculptures result from this relationship, through which shifting lines seep in, breaking down, with sharp irony, the rigidity of strictly cerebral constructions".
Stella Teixeira de Barros
Barros, Stella Teixeira de. Onde o ser e o estar igual fora. In: Hermano, Luiz. Luiz Hermano. n. p.
"In Luiz Hermano's work, line is the building element both on the plane and in three dimensions. It is the thread that, entangled, weaves the web and captures the figure and, braided, builds the form. In drawing - the core of his visual discourse - the line derives from broad, sinuous movements or tight, tangled ones. The gesture denotes a voluptuous pleasure in curves and roundness, in the repetition of motifs: it becomes graphic when it marks the support and tactile when it handles matter. The gesture is a back-and-forth of the hand, insistent as in a child's scribble or in the act of weaving. A certain automatism in this making frees the imagination; what passes into the work are memories, sensations, fragments of stories.
Among the recurring signs in the artist's production - drawing, printmaking, painting and sculpture - two stand out: the spiral and the Möbius strip, on their own or forming other shapes. The attentive eye will discover that fauns, mermaids, spaceships, larvae, algae, mollusks and other images are made of a tangle of lines that in the prints replaces the regularity of hatching. In the same way, those signs can be recognized in the weave that structures the objects".
Maria Alice Milliet
Milliet, Maria Alice. Luiz Hermano: construção de um imaginário. In: HERMANO, Luiz. Luiz Hermano: esculturas para vestir. Apres. Maria Alice Milliet. São Paulo: MAM, 1994.
Collections
Acervo da Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo/Brasil
Biblioteca Nacional de Paris - Paris, França
Brazilian Embassy in Berlin - Alemanha
Brazilian Embassy in Jakarta - Jacarta, Indonésia
Coleção Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo - MAC/USP - São Paulo SP
Coleção Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo - MAM/SP
Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand - Masp - São Paulo SP
Museu de Arte Brasileira, MAB/Faap - São Paulo SP
Museu de Arte Contemporânea - MAC - Recife PE
Museu de Arte Contemporânea - MAC - Fortaleza CE
Museu de Arte Contemporânea - MAC - Curitiba PR
Museu da Gravura da Cidade de Curitiba - Curitiba PR
Metrô de São Paulo - Estação República - São Paulo SP
Solo Exhibitions
1978 - Fortaleza CE - Solo, at Galeria Credimus
1979 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Masp
1981 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Masp
1982 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at MAC/USP
1983 - Brasília DF - Solo, at Fundação Cultural de Brasília
1983 - Cuiabá MT - Solo, at Museu de Arte e Cultura Popular
1983 - Fortaleza CE - Solo, at Arte Galeria
1984 - Paris (France) - Solo, at Galeria Debret
1984 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Paço das Artes
1985 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Paço das Artes
1986 - São Paulo SP - Bélico [Warlike], at Galeria Unidade Dois
1987 - São Paulo SP - Luiz Hermano, at the studio of Alex Cerveny, Eide Feldon, Humberto Brasil and Luis Hermano
1987 - São Paulo SP and Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Montesanti Galeria
1987 - Washington and New York (United States) - Astronave [Spaceship], at Brazilian American Culture Institute and Art Studio
1989 - Curitiba PR - Projetos para Dias de Chuva [Projects for Rainy Days], at Museu da Gravura da Cidade de Curitiba
1990 - São Paulo SP - Imagem Objeto [Image Object], at MAC/USP
1992 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Galeria Montesanti-Roesler
1993 - Berlin (Germany) - Solo, at Epiphaniekirche, Charlottenburg
1994 - São Paulo SP - Esculturas para Vestir [Sculptures to Wear], at MAM/SP
1995 - Goiânia GO - Luiz Hermano: objetos [Luiz Hermano: Objects], at Marina Potrich Galeria de Arte
1995 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Joel Edelstein Arte Contemporânea
1995 - São José dos Campos SP - Gravuras, Pinturas e Objetos [Prints, Paintings and Objects], at Fundação Cultural Cassiano Ricardo
1996 - Morro da Viagem ES - Solo, at Estação Cultural Mosteiro Zen Budista
1997 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
1998 - Fortaleza CE - Solo, at Centro Cultural da Abolição
1999 - Belo Horizonte MG - Solo, at Kolams Galeria de Arte
1999 - Recife PE - Solo, at Galeria Ária
1999 - Brasília DF - Solo, at Referência Galeria de Arte
2000 - Brasília DF - Solo, at Galeria Referência
2000 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at MAM/SP - Nestlé
2000 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
2001 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Paço das Artes
2001 - Berlin (Germany) - Solo, at Embaixada do Brasil
2002 - Stuttgart (Germany) - Solo, at Adriana Schmidt Gallery
2003 - São Paulo SP - Ludens, at Galeria Nara Roesler
Group Exhibitions
1979 - Fortaleza CE - Salão de Abril [April Salon] - first prize in printmaking
1980 - Curitiba PR - 3rd Print Exhibition, at Casa da Gravura Solar do Barão - acquisition prize
1980 - Fortaleza CE - 8th Ceará National Salon - acquisition prize
1980 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 3rd National Visual Arts Salon, at MNBA
1980 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - National Contemporary Art Salon
1980 - São Paulo SP - 1st Contemporary Art Salon
1980 - São Paulo SP - Desenho Jovem [Young Drawing], at MAC/USP
1980 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 3rd National Visual Arts Salon
1981 - Curitiba PR - 38th Paraná Salon, at Teatro Guaíra
1981 - Curitiba PR - 3rd Brazilian Drawing Show - acquisition prize
1981 - Curitiba PR - 4th Curitiba Annual Printmaking Show, at Casa da Gravura Solar do Barão
1981 - Piracicaba SP - 14th Piracicaba Contemporary Art Salon, at Casa das Artes Plásticas Miguel Dutra
1981 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 4th National Visual Arts Salon, at MAM/RJ
1981 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - National Contemporary Art Salon
1981 - San Juan (Puerto Rico) - 5th Print Biennial
1981 - São Paulo SP - 16th São Paulo International Biennial
1981 - Seoul (Korea) - 4th Seoul International Biennial
1982 - Curitiba PR - 5th Curitiba Annual Printmaking Show, at Casa da Gravura Solar do Barão
1982 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 5th National Visual Arts Salon, at MAM/RJ - acquisition prize
1983 - Seoul (Korea) - 5th Seoul International Biennial
1984 - Curitiba PR - 1st Latin American Print Biennial
1984 - Curitiba PR - 6th Curitiba City Printmaking Show
1984 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - National Contemporary Art Salon
1984 - Santo André SP - 12th Santo André Contemporary Art Salon, at Paço Municipal
1984 - São Paulo SP - 15th Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1984 - São Paulo SP - Art in the Street 2
1984 - São Paulo SP - Chandon Art and Wine Prize - first prize, travel abroad
1986 - Curitiba PR - 7th Collection of the National Print Museum - Casa da Gravura, at Museu Guido Viaro
1986 - Havana (Cuba) - 2nd Pan-American Biennial of Havana
1986 - São Paulo SP - 1st Helena Rubinstein Young Art Selection, at Museu de Arte de São Paulo
1987 - Paris (France) - Première Sélection de l'Art Jeune Brésilien, at Maison de l'Amérique Latine
1987 - São Paulo SP - 19th São Paulo International Biennial, at Fundação Bienal - special room
1987 - São Paulo SP - A Trama do Gosto/Objetos [The Weave of Taste/Objects], at Fundação Bienal
1987 - São Paulo SP - Première Sélection de l'Art Jeune Brésilien, at Masp
1990 - Curitiba PR - 9th Curitiba City Printmaking Show, at Museu da Gravura
1990 - São Paulo SP - 21st Panorama of Current Brazilian Art, at MAM/SP
1990 - São Paulo SP - 9 Artistas [9 Artists], at Adriana Penteado Arte Contemporânea
1990 - São Paulo SP - Arte Gravura Hoje [Art Printmaking Today], at Paço das Artes
1990 - São Paulo SP - Gente de Fibra [People of Fiber], at Sesc Pompeia
1990 - São Paulo SP - Objetos [Objects], at Galeria Casa Triângulo
1991 - São Paulo SP - 21st São Paulo International Biennial, at Fundação Bienal de São Paulo
1991 - Brazil-Germany Workshop - traveling exhibition
1992 - Paris (France) - Gravadores do Séc. XX [20th-Century Printmakers], at Biblioteca Nacional de Paris
1992 - Poços de Caldas MG - Brazilian Modern Art: Collection of the Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo, at Casa da Cultura
1992 - São Paulo SP - 7th Brazilian Art Salon, at Fundação Mokiti Okada
1992 - São Paulo SP - The Seduction of Volumes: The Three-Dimensional Works of the MAC, at MAC/USP
1992 - São Paulo SP - Arte Brasileira na Coleção Anos 70, 80, 90 [Brazilian Art in the Collection: 1970s, 80s, 90s], at MAC/USP
1992 - São Paulo SP - Fundação Mokiti Okada Show - travel prize to New York
1992 - São Paulo SP - Nove Artistas [Nine Artists], at Adriana Penteado Arte Contemporânea
1994 - Miami and Chicago (United States) - Objetos [Objects], at Art Miami and Chicago International Art Exposition
1994 - São Paulo SP - Bandeiras: 60 artistas homenageiam os 60 anos da USP [Flags: 60 Artists Celebrate USP's 60th Anniversary], at MAC/USP
1995 - São Paulo SP - Brazil Japan Art, at Fundação Mokiti Okada
1995 - São Paulo SP - Coletiva 34 [Group Show 34], at Adriana Penteado Arte Contemporânea
1995 - São Paulo SP - Entre Objetos [Among Objects], at Galeria Nara Roesler
1996 - Santiago (Chile) - Viva Brasil, at MAC/Santiago
1996 - São Paulo SP - 15 Brazilian Artists, at MAM/SP
1996 - São Paulo SP - Bandeiras [Flags], at Galeria de Arte do Sesi
1997 - Ouro Preto MG - Experiences and Perspectives: 12 Contemporary Visions, at Museu Casa dos Contos. Centro de Estudos do Ciclo do Ouro
1997 - Ouro Preto MG - UFMG Winter Festival. Experiences and Perspectives: 12 Visions
1997 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 15 Brazilian Artists, at MAM/RJ
1997 - São Paulo SP - 3rd United Artists: Light, at Casa das Rosas
1997 - São Paulo SP - Dimensões da Arte Contemporânea [Dimensions of Contemporary Art], at MAC/USP
1997 - São Paulo SP - Luz [Light], at Casa das Rosas
1997 - São Paulo SP - Three-Dimensionality in 20th-Century Brazilian Art, at Itaú Cultural
1997 - São Paulo SP - A Cidade dos Artistas [The Artists' City], at MAC/SP
1997 - São Paulo SP - Arte Suporte Computador [Art Medium Computer], at Casa das Rosas
1998 - Belo Horizonte MG - Three-Dimensionality in 20th-Century Brazilian Art, at Itaú Cultural
1998 - Brasília DF - Three-Dimensionality in 20th-Century Brazilian Art, at Itaugaleria
1998 - Fortaleza CE - Ceará and Pernambuco: Dragons and Lions, at Centro Dragão do Mar de Arte e Cultura
1998 - Penápolis SP - Three-Dimensionality in 20th-Century Brazilian Art, at Galeria Itaú Cultural
1998 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - 16th National Visual Arts Salon, at MAM/RJ
1998 - São Paulo SP - Múltiplos [Multiples], at Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
1998 - Madrid (Spain) - ARCO - Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
1999 - Goiânia GO - 2nd Great Group Show of Brazilian Art, at Galeria de Arte Marina Potrich
1999 - Paris (France) - FIAC - Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
1999 - Ribeirão Preto SP - Dudi Maia Rosa, Cristina Rogozinski, Eliane Prolik, Frederico Pinto, Luiz Hermano, Marcia Pastore and Paulo Humberto, at Museu de Arte de Ribeirão Preto Pedro Manuel-Gismondi
2000 - São Paulo SP - End of the Millennium: The 1990s at the MAM, at MAM/SP
2000 - São Paulo SP - New Work, at MAC/SP
2001 - Brusque SC - 1st International Sculpture Symposium of Brazil
2001 - Madrid (Spain) - ARCO - Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
2001 - New York (United States) - The Thread Unraveled: Contemporary Brazilian Art, at El Museo del Barrio
2001 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - The Spirit of Our Time, at MAM/RJ
2001 - São Paulo SP - Museu de Arte Brasileira: 40 Years, at Museu de Arte Brasileira
2001 - São Paulo SP - The Spirit of Our Time, at MAM/SP
2001 - São Paulo SP - Pequenos Formatos [Small Formats], at Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
2001 - São Paulo SP - Caminhos da Forma [Paths of Form], at Sesi - MAC/SP
2002 - Buenos Aires (Argentina) - The Thread Unravelled: Contemporary Brazilian Art, at Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires
2002 - Caracas (Venezuela) - FIA, at Galeria Adriana Schmidt
2002 - Curitiba PR - Faxinal das Artes, at MAC/Curitiba
2002 - Madrid (Spain) - ARCO - Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
2002 - São Paulo SP - Imaginary Mexico: The Gaze of the Brazilian Artist, at Casa das Rosas
2002 - São Paulo SP - O Orgânico em Colapso [The Organic in Collapse], at Valu Oria Galeria de Arte
2002 - São Paulo SP - Open Opera: Celebration, at Casa das Rosas
2003 - Curitiba PR - 6th João Turin Three-Dimensional Art Show, at Casa Andrade Muricy
2003 - Curitiba PR - Heterodoxia: edição Curitiba [Heterodoxy: Curitiba Edition], at Museu Metropolitano de Arte de Curitiba
2003 - Goiânia GO - Heterodoxia: edição Goiânia [Heterodoxy: Goiânia Edition], at Universidade Federal de Goiás. Faculdade de Artes Visuais
2003 - João Pessoa PB - Heterodoxia: edição João Pessoa [Heterodoxy: João Pessoa Edition], at Galeria de Arte Archidy Picado
2003 - Recife PE - See Again/See the New, at MAMAM
2003 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Brazilianart Project, at Almacén Galeria de Arte
2003 - São Paulo SP - Entre Aberto [Ajar], at Gravura Brasileira
2003 - São Paulo SP - MAC USP 40 Years: Contemporary Interfaces, at MAC/USP
2004 - Campinas SP - Metrópolis Collection of Contemporary Art, at Espaço Cultural CPFL
2004 - Fortaleza CE - Heterodoxia: edição Fortaleza [Heterodoxy: Fortaleza Edition], at Centro Dragão do Mar de Arte e Cultura
2004 - São Paulo SP - New Acquisitions: 1995 - 2003, at Museu de Arte Brasileira/Faap
2004 - São Paulo SP - Pintura Reencarnada [Reincarnated Painting], at Paço das Artes
Source: Itaú Cultural
