Maria Auxiliadora (artist)

Maria Auxiliadora da Silva
Born (1935-05-24)May 24, 1935
Campo Belo, Minas Gerais, Brazil
Died August 20, 1974(1974-08-20) (aged 39)
São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
Nationality Brazil
Style Painting

Maria Auxiliadora da Silva (Campo Belo, MG 1935 - São Paulo, SP 1974) was a self-taught Brazilian painter.[1] Her work was nationally and internationally acclaimed, depicting her own universe, including scenes of domestic and rural life, Afro-Brazilian religions and traditions, and self-portraits.

She is one of 18 siblings, many of which also artists that would exhibit in art fairs in Embu das Artes and in República Square, in São Paulo. Other artists part of the Silva family include the sculptor Vicente Paulo da Silva (1930-1980); the painters Benedito da Silva (1953-1998), Cândido Silva (1933) and Conceição Aparecida Silva (1938); the poet Natália Natalice da Silva (1948); the painter and dollmaker Georgina "Gina" Penha da Silva (1949); and the story teller Efigênia Rosário da Silva (1937).[2] Their mother, Maria Trindade de Almeida Silva (1909-1991) was also an artist, working with sculpture, painting, poetry and embroidery. Their father, José Cândido da Silva, was a railroad handy man that played the accordion.[3]

Life

Maria Auxiliadora and her family moved to the city of São Paulo when she was only three years old. She stopped going to school at age 12 to help out her family by working as a maid, only returning to get an education in 1972, at age 37.[2]

In 1972, she is diagnosed with cancer, undergoing six surgeries in 10 months, and treatment in spiritist and candomblé centers. She never stopped painting, and would portray aspects of her disease like hospitals, ambulances, angels and funerals. Maria Auxiliadora died of cancer on August 20, 1974.[4]

Artistic career

Maria Auxiliadora did not have any formal training in the arts. She learns embroidery from her mother at age 9 and starts drawing with charcoal at age 14. By 16, she is using colored pencils and guache, only moving on to oil painting by 26.[4] She decides do dedicate herself exclusively to paining in 1967.[5]

In 1968, along with some of her siblings, she joins the artist group spearheaded by the artist, musician and poet Solano Trindade in Embu das Artes, São Paulo. In the same year, she participates in multiple shows in the state of São Paulo, winning first prize at the V Art Exhibit of Embu das Artes.[6]

By the early 1970s she became discontent with the art scene in Embu, that was losing its focus on Afro-Brazilian art and culture. She moves back to the city of São Paulo and starts exhibiting her works at República Square. There, she meets the German marchand Werner Arnhold and the Brazilian art critic Mário Schemberg. The later introduced her to the consul for the American Embassy, Alan Fisher, who organized a show of her works in the Embassy's Library in 1971.[2]

She gained popularity in Europe thanks to Arnhold, who took her work to art fairs and galleries in Basel, Düsseldorf and Paris.[3] In 1971, Pierre Bouvet, the director of the Musée d'Art Naïf et des Arts Singuliers, acquired her paintings for their collections.

Technique

Maria Auxiliadora chronicled what her day-by-day in her paintings. She used acrylic paint in bold colors, emphasizing with three-dimensionality parts of the human body and of the landscapes.[7]

In an interview to Lea Coelho Frota in 1972, the artist says that her first paintings in 1968 were flat, with no texture. She started playing with dimensionality, adding thick layers of paint or plaster mixed with her own hair when painting figures.[8] Around the same time, she starts exploring with the use of text, writing dialogues out of the mouths of the figures she painted in the style of comics.

Critical recognition

Auxiliadora gained more notoriety after her death, particularly overseas. A book about her work was published by the Italian publisher Giulio Bolaffi in 1977, with contributions by Max Fourny, director of the Musée d’art naïf de Vicq en Île-de-France, Emanuel von Lauenstein Massarani, cultural attache of Brasil in Switzerland, and Pietro Maria Bardi, director of the Museum of Art of São Paulo (MASP).[9] Tribute solo shows were organized in Italy, France and Germany, as well as in MASP and the National Museum of Fine Arts, in Rio de Janeiro.

Massarani characterized her work as being in the border of art naïf and art brut, far from social and cultural conformity.[9] Because of her hybridism of painting and reliefs, Leia Coelho Frota defined Auxiliadora's visual expression as bordering on pop art.[8]

References

  1. ↑ Ayala, Walmir (1997). Dicionário de pintores brasileiros. UFPR.
  2. 1 2 3 Regina, Büll, Márcia (2007-08-29). "Artistas primitivos, ingênuos (naïfs), populares, contemporâneos, afro-brasileiros: Família Silva: um estudo sobre resistência cultural".
  3. 1 2 "Maria Auxiliadora da Silva (1935-1974)". antigo.acordacultura.org.br (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2017-05-07.
  4. 1 2 Frota, Léia Coelho (2005). Pequeno Dicionário do Povo Brasileiro. Rio de Janeiro: Aeroplano.
  5. ↑ Festa das Cores. São Paulo: MASP. 1975.
  6. ↑ Cultural, Instituto Itaú. "Maria Auxiliadora | Enciclopédia Itaú Cultural". Enciclopédia Itaú Cultural (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2017-05-07.
  7. ↑ D'Ambrosio, Oscar. "Maria Auxiliadora da Silva - um cometa das artes". www.geledes.org.br (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2017-05-07.
  8. 1 2 Frota, Léia Coelho (1978). Mitopoética de 9 Artistas Brasileiros. Rio de Janeiro: FUNARTE.
  9. 1 2 Silva, Maria Auxiliadora da; Laurenstein Massarani, Emanuel von; Bardi, Pietro Maria; Fourny, Max (1977-01-01). Maria Auxiliadora da Silva. Torino: G. Bolaffi.
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