Descripción de la Exposición
For the future we are looking forward to showing more hidden gems from the family collection and to strengthen our connections with the Portuguese art scene through collaboration. Following this mindset, we have invited Luiza Teixeira de Freitas, curator based in Lisbon, to be our curator at large for 2021-2022 to work together with Aveline de Bruin on the program. Luiza has collaborated with us in the past but more than that has been a close friend and confident throughout the years.
Taken from a poem by João Cabral de Melo Neto, the title for this year’s collaboration at Quetzal Art Centre, A rooster alone does not weave the dawn alludes to the importance of working together, of cooperation, of dialogue. Working together, Aveline de Bruin and Luiza Teixeira de Freitas will curate a variety of projects, group exhibitions and solo presentations by artists, trying to respond with sensibility to these strange times the world goes through. Intertwining and enabling for a variety of ideas to exist parallel to each other, the mind-set is to focus on the present whilst allowing for discovery, collaboration and encounter. Just like in the poem, believing that each dawn brings us a new opportunity to do so.
The first project to happen is Osmosis, a wall commission by Hugo Canoilas.
OSMOSIS - HUGO CANOILAS
Departing from an idea to develop and produce traces of paintings on the wall as they happen in his own studio walls, and use them as non-rational maps where some imagery around his previous grotto project could be placed. The grotto was a project developed by Canoilas with Galeria Quadrado Azul, in Lisbon. Using part of the gallery’s basement floor, the grotto worked as a collective work and an experimental platform that seeked to create a community between a group of artists, the gallery and its audience. The wall he produced for Quetzal, unfolds a map of already done interventions, historical associations, and many desires. The marks are made with high fluid acrylic paint on a thin canvas and water and the imagery is transferred (with a special water-based material) from digital prints into the wall. The way they are done creates a kind of camouflage or discovery game of the viewer, who seeks to discover among the wall-painting the hidden insertions.
LUIZA TEIXEIRA DE FREITAS
“I am thrilled and very much looking forward in working together with Aveline. We have collaborated in the past and from that experience I know the pleasure it is, not only to work with her, but also to be part of a project that enables for art to happen in such a special and unique setting. Furthermore, to incentivate that art leaves the urban centres and finds way and space in more remote and rural locations. Our focus this year will be mostly the local Portuguese panorama and in an abstract and organic way to reflect the times we are living through. We are, as everyone else in the world, conditioned to take each decision as we go along, and it is with this responsibility in mind that we will build a sensible thorough programme.”
Luiza Teixeira de Freitas is an independent curator based in Lisbon. Among the various projects she is involved with, her curatorial work with private collections stands out, as well as her active relationship with independent publications and artist books, having launched her own publisher Taffimai in 2018. Although based in Portugal, she frequently works with projects in São Paulo, New York, London, Los Angeles and has also a strong connection with the Middle East. Luiza is a strategy consultant at the Delfina Foundation in London, on the Board of Directors of Bidoun magazine and platform; and also, President and Board member of Operação Nariz Vermelho, Portugal. Luiza has an MFA in Curating from Goldmsiths University and her recent exhibitions include – Shell Game Andreia Santana and Anna-Sophie Berger (Galeria Filomena Soares, Lisbon, 2021); Volta Grande Alexandre Estrela (PIVÔ, São Paulo, 2019); Tandem – a one-year project with five exhibitions (Alexander and Bonin, New York, 2019); There will never be a door. You are inside. Works from the Teixeira de Freitas Collection, (Santander Foundation, Madrid, 2019), A Shimmer of Possibilities (Fundação Eugénio de Almeida, Évora, 2017), Projects LA (Los Angeles, 2017), The Hollow and the Amendment Paloma Bosquê (White Pavilion, City Museum, Lisbon, 2017); At Arm’s Length Amalia Pica (NC Arte, Bogotá, 2017); What I Am (MAAT, Lisbon, 2017); An Infinite Conversation (Berardo Museum, Lisbon, 2014); Apestraction Damián Ortega (Freud Museum, London, 2013); Luiza was also part of the curatorial team of the Bienal Anozero in Coimbra Healing and Repairing (2017); she was assistant curator of the Marrakech Biennial, Works and Places (2009) and collaborated with Tate Modern, London, in the exhibitions of Cildo Meireles and Cy Twombly (2008).
Exposición. 19 nov de 2024 - 02 mar de 2025 / Museo Nacional del Prado / Madrid, España
Formación. 23 nov de 2024 - 29 nov de 2024 / Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (MNCARS) / Madrid, España