Ernesto Neto - Soplo

This retrospective brings together 60 works by Ernesto Neto, one of the most prominent names in contemporary sculpture. Since the beginning of his career, in the 1980s, the artist has been producing a body of work that sets in motion a dialogue between the exhibition space and the various dimensions of the spectator.

Bringing into play his unique comprehension of Neo-Concrete heritage, Neto unfolds his initial sculptures –elaborated from materials such as polyamide stockings, polystyrene spheres, spices and herbs– into large, immersive installations that proposes to the spectator a space for conviviality, for taking a breath and for fostering consciousness and awareness. His sculptural practice is engendered by the tension embodied in textile materials and in handicraft techniques like crochet. These great ludic structures accommodate rituals and actions that reveal the artist’s current concerns: the affirmation of the body as an element that cannot be dissociated from the mind and from spirituality.

The exhibition proposes to demonstrate how physicality, the individual and the collective have always been present from the very start in the artist’s practice, shaping his poetics. His current collaboration with political and spiritual leaders of the Huni Kuin nations, whose contributions to the artist receive in the exhibition a room of his own, emerges as a natural consequence of his sculptural research.

Jointly organized with Pinacoteca de São Paulo. Curators: Jochen Volz y Valeria Piccoli.