Exhibition – RED LIGHT: Sexaulity and Representation in the Norlinda and José Lima Collection
Artists: Alberto García-Alix, Albuquerque Mendes, Álvaro Lapa, Ana Cardoso, Ana Laura Aláez, André Cepeda, Andres Serrano, Ângelo De Sousa, António Trindade, Artur Cruzeiro Seixas, Bernard Rancillac, Carlos Figueiredo, Carlos Lobo, Carlos Vidal, Carmen Calvo, Cindy Sherman, Eduardo Arroyo, Enrique Marty, Fernão Cruz, Francisco Relógio, Gonçalo Pena, Graça Pereira Coutinho, Graça Sarsfield, Helena Abreu, Ilda David, Jacques Monory, João Gabriel, João Maria Gusmão + Pedro Paiva, João Onofre, João Pedro Vale + Nuno Alexandre Ferreira, João Penalva, João Tabarra, João Vilhena, Joaquim Bravo, Joaquim Rodrigo, Jorge Galindo, José De Guimarães, Júlia Ventura, Julião Sarmento, Júlio Pomar, Kcho, Leonel Moura, Luís Demée, Manuel Botelho, Mário Cesariny, Mauro Cerqueira, Miguel Palma, Muntean/Rosenblum, Musa Paradisiaca, Nan Goldin, Nancy Spero, Nelson Leirner, Nikias Skapinakis, Nobuyoshi Araki, Paula Sousa Cardoso, Paulo Nozolino, Pedro Casqueiro, Pedro Proença, Pedro Tudela, Raúl Perez, Ricardo Valentim, Rigo, Robert Longo, Rosa Carvalho, Rui Chafes, Sam Samore, Santiago Ydáñez, Tiago Baptista, Vanessa Beecroft, Vasco Barata, Vicente De Mello
Centro de Arte Oliva; São João da Madeira
Dates: 2020-09-26 – 2021-07-04
Curatorship: Sandra Vieira Jürgens
RED LIGHT introduces a selection of artworks from the Norlinda and José Lima Collection, with the approach to sexuality as a common thread, split into multiple topics, presented as a contrapuntal complement as well as a dissonant confrontation: the representation of the body, male and female nudity, eroticism, fantasy, desire and pain, the object and the subject, pleasure and domination, the places of feminine representation, the male gaze, voyeurism, exhibitionism and self-representation in art.
Talking about sexuality and the relation between bodies during a pandemic that forces the withdrawal and even the abstinence from physical contact is also to reflect on the consequences of distancing as it happens. The simultaneous weakening of the individual and the community, conditioned by the fear of infection, what space and conditions does it allow for the desired collective and individual gathering of bodies? And what role can the evocation of eroticism (or erotic vocation) of art have in the reassessment of desire and risk in a society henceforth more alert to the meaning and the implications of physical proximity?
The exhibition includes pieces by over seventy artists and the artworks on display are organised aside from a monolithic vision of the subject, the chronology and the attempt to categorise movements, mixing different origins and periods. From a transgenerational panorama, of multiple approaches to an essential and fundamental dimension of existence, RED LIGHT creates a space free from conventions, moralities and manifestos, inviting sensitive and intuitive contact with the pieces, reclaiming visual pleasure and assuming the attraction of pictorial and photographic eroticism.
