janela

Por Afonso Luz | sobre a série Urbana

A cidade se espelha fragmentada nos módulos envidraçados da fachada de um edificio recém erguido. Suas faces quebradas se recompõem num lúcido espetáculo fazendo-nos experimentar a imagem imprecisa de seu rosto fictício. Tudo na superfície urbana perde sua solidez e se desfaz em espectro de luz suspenso no ar. Erraticamente vagando por este labirinto de espelhamentos tortuosos, espectadores da urbe atual, nos dissolvemos em rápidos reflexos que num relance se apagam ou se reconfiguram noutra ilusão. Caminhamos pela cenográfica rua fascinados pela informação acelerada que nos cega como quem se entrega a um alheamento prazeroso, eterno impulso ao gozo narcísico. Também a cidade, convertida em Eu, é tragada pelo encanto de sua própria imagem projetada. Sucumbimos todos à implosiva potência egóica que consome a si na veloz imediaticidade do reflexo? Ou, prosaicamente, a especulação imobiliária faz seu retrato de parede ?

Partindo dessa experiência alucinante da São Paulo contemporânea essas quase pinturas que Helen Faganello nos apresenta buscam mimetizar algo dessa lógica da imaginária reprodução urbana. Nos quadros convivem impressão oriunda da fotografia e escassa pintura com tinta acrílica, oscilando entre hiper-realismo e operação de imagem num campo fluido de linguagens estéticas atuais. Na nova série projetada para o espaço do SESC Avenida Paulista, se valendo da situação especifica, as telas ficticias dispõem-se ao trânsito da avenida capturando o engano ótico do passante. E nos perguntamos: seriam reflexos ou reflexão?

Afonso Luz, 2003

window

The glass modules of the facade of a recently constructed building reflect a fragmented image of the city. Its broken sides are put back together in a lucid spectacle while we experience the imprecise image of its fictitious face. Everything on the urban surface loses its solidity and melts into a spectrum of light suspended in the air. Erratically wandering around this maze of tortuous mirrors we, the spectators of the city of today, dissolve in quick reflexes that either disappear or become another illusion in a glimpse. Fascinated by the fast speed of information that blinds us as someone who gives oneself to a pleasurable distance, eternal impulse towards narcissistic joy, we walk along the scenographic street. The city as well, converted into Me, is dragged by the charm of its own projected image. Do we all succumb to the implosive egoical potency that wares itself in the speedy immediateness of the reflex? Or, prosaically, real estate speculation makes its wall portrait.

Based on this dazzling experience in contemporary São Paulo, Helen Faganello’s “almost paintings” seek to mimetize something that pertains to the logic of the imaginary urban reproduction. In her pieces, the printing that comes from photography and the sparse acrylic painting share the same space; the result is works that oscillate between hyperrealism and the operation of the image in a fluid field of today’s aesthetical languages. In the new series designed to the shown at SESC Avenida Paulista, the artist takes advantage of this particular situation and the fictitious paintings are shown to the transit of the Avenue capturing the optic mistake of the passer-by. And we ask ourselves: are they reflexes or reflexion?

by Afonso Luz, São Paulo, 2003

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Afonso Luz is an art critic, holds a B.A in Philosophy from the University of São Paulo and is a researcher in field of aesthetics and art history. He was consultant to the Monumenta – IPHAN/BID/UNESCO program for the Economy of Culture, Visual Arts and Cultural Critique; advisor to the Ministry of Culture during the Gilberto Gil administration and coordinator of the “Cultura e Pensamento” Program. He was responsible for the Brazilian participation at the ARCO08 Art Fair of Madrid, Brazilian art exportation project in partnership with APEX and Fundação Bienal de São Paulo, as well as international art fairs. He has coordinated the Brazilian Committee for Art Internationalization and Economy and the Brazil Contemporary Art Program (MinC). He was Director of Research and Monitoring and Assistant Secretary of Cultural Policies of the Ministry of Culture.