Associação Cultural Videobrasil

The first major Videobrasil Collection exhibit started touring the world, beginning in Argentina. Unerasable Memories – A Historic Look at the Videobrasil Collection opened officially in the Argentinian capital on June 25, at the Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA), curated by its artistic director Agustín Pérez Rubio. Earlier, Videobrasil’s curator and director Solange Farkas had an open conversation with the public, alongside Pérez Rubio. In Argentina, the exhibition spans two other venues in the city of Buenos Aires: the Cultural Space of the Embassy of Brazil (opening on July 2) and Universidad Torcuato Di Tella (opening on July 17). In line with Videobrasil’s project, the travelling exhibit’s stint in Argentina features Public Programs meetings, courses, and conversations.

Videobrasil’s director and the exhibition curator discussed the recent history of Associação, focusing on its public actions, its interest in art production from the geopolitical South, and the building of its collection. Invited by Solange Farkas, Agustín Pérez Rubio carefully scrutinized the collection of 1300-plus video works and picked out the eighteen pieces with heavy political and social agendas that comprise the exhibit. From Brazil’s “discovery” by the Portuguese to the military coup d’état in Chile, including the September 11 attacks in the USA, China’s Tiananmen Square Massacre, or civil war in Lebanon, the show features stories kept alive by the sensibility and the work of artists from those areas. “The artworks interrelate in their themes, chronologies, and territories or conflicts experienced by actual persons, and the accounts thereof,” Pérez Rubio explains. “Violence, war, borders, race, sex, gender, slavery keep tormenting us. We want art to repossess this collection of experiences lived, from the beautiful to the cruelest, most inhumane, so that we may learn from them constantly,” says the curator.

Check out the dates and works exhibited in the three spaces that host the exhibition Unerasable memories in Buenos Aires:

From June 25 through August 20, MALBA shows works by Dan Halter (Untitled — (Zimbabwean Queen of Rave), 2005), Jonathas de Andrade (Projeto Pacífico, 2010), León Ferrari & Ricardo Pons (Casa Blanca, 2005), Liu Wei (Unforgettable Memory, 2009), Rosângela Rennó (Veracruz, 2000), Sebastian Diaz Morales (Lucharemos hasta anular la ley, 2004) and Vincent Carelli & Dominque Gallois (A Arca dos Zo'e, 1993).

From July 2 to August 14, the Cultural Space of the Embassy of Brazil features artworks by Aurélio Michiles (O Sangue da Terra, 1984), Ayrson Heráclito & Danillo Barata (Barrueco, 2004), Coco Fusco (Bare Life Study #1, 2005), Enio Staub (Contestado, a Guerra Desconhecida, 1985), Luiz de Abreu (O Samba do Crioulo Doido, 2013), Mwangi Hutter (My Possession, 2005), and Walid Raad (The Loudest Muttering is Over: Documents From The Atlas Group Archive, 2003).

Finally, between July 17 and August 14, the exhibition hall at Universidad Torcuato Di Tella features videos by Akram Zaatari (In this house, 2004), Bouchra Khalili (Four Selected Videos From The Mapping Journey Project, 2010), Carlos Motta (Letter to My Father (Standing by the Fence), 2005) and Rabih Mroué (Face A Face B, 2002).

The exhibit premiered in Brazil from August to November 2014, at Sesc Pompeia (São Paulo, Brazil). In 2015, Unerasable memories — A historic look at the Videobrasil Collection will travel to Spain and Germany. Before the end of 2016, the show will also go to Mexico.

Course explores memories of conquest in art, literature, cinema and music in Brazil

Besides the talk with Solange Farkas and Agustín Pérez Rubio, the exhibition’s run at MALBA features the course Memories of conquest: its expression in art, literature, cinema, and music in Brazil. The course is taught by professor Gonzalo Aguilar, from the School of Philosophy and Languages at Universidad de Buenos Aires, on Fridays, from June 26 to July 17.

Aguilar sets out to reflect on “conquest” and its reverberations: do “winners” and “losers” evoke them in the same way? What vestiges are left of violence and domination? How does one build a perspective that challenges official versions? How to retrieve the images and words of those who were defeated? The artworks featured in the exhibit are connected with literary texts, essays, videos, films, and works by Brazilian artists and authors of the likes of Caetano Veloso, Clarice Lispector, Gilberto Gil, Machado de Assis and Tarsila do Amaral. Learn more.

Memorias imborrables — Una mirada histórica sobre la Colección Videobrasil
June 25to August 20
Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA) | Avenida Figueroa Alcorta 3415, Buenos Aires, Argentina
www.malba.org.ar

July 2 to August 14
Cultural Space of the Embassy of Brazil | Calle Arroyo 1142, Buenos Aires, Argentina
www.buenosaires.itamaraty.gov.br

July 17 to August 14
Universidad Torcuato Di Tella's exhibition hall | Avenida Figueroa Alcorta 7350, Buenos Aires, Argentina
www.utdt.edu