Photo: Jéssica Bernardo
In his recent survey exhibition, "Na Cidade da Ressaca" (In the Hangover City, 2023), Jonathas de Andrade portrays Recife, Brazil, where he lives today (born in Maceió, 1982). The exhibition took place in Recife and brought together all of Jonathas' projects that used the city as a starting point, reflecting its significant influence on his political and historical understanding and his development as an artist. Jonathas engages with memory and how it affects objects and symbols in Brazilian society. His primary mediums—installation, photography, and video—serve as tools to delve into the impacts of relationships and forms through the consequences of urbanization and power.
Through his work, de Andrade scrutinizes the resonances of modernist culture in Brazilian society, particularly in light of the repressive politics in Brazil during the 20th century. His engagement with Brazilian modernism, which frequently juxtaposed indigenous and African elements with modernist aesthetics, situates him within a legacy of artists confronting a colonial past and its contemporary continuities.
Since 2007, de Andrade has collaborated with the artist collective A Casa como Convém (The House as It Should Be), which he co-founded in Recife. One of his notable works is the mural "Nostalgia, a Class Sentiment" (Nostalgia, Sentimiento de Clase, 2012), which, with its geometric tiles and manifestos from the 1960s and 1970s, provokes an understanding of Brazil's modernization projects and their failure to achieve sustainable change.
His recent solo exhibitions have been showcased at, among other institutions, the Brazilian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale (2022), MAAT Lisbon (2023), FOAM Amsterdam (2022), and MCA Chicago (2019).
Language: English
Price: 80 SEK (free admission for students)
Tickets: www.stadsmissionen.se/motesplats-mariatorget/kalendarium
World in My Eyes – An Artist Lecture Series
All the islands in the ocean
All the heavens in the motion
Let me show you the world in my eyes
// Depeche Mode (1990)
In its second season, the artist talk series World in My Eyes presents Jonathas de Andrade, Selma Selman, Salman Toor, and Cecilia Vicuña. Each artist contributes to both the discursive and formal hybridity of contemporary art at a moment of acute geopolitical volatility and increasing polarization.
Launched in 2023, World in My Eyes is an artist lecture series in Stockholm presented through a collaboration between Konstfack University of Arts, Crafts and Design; Moderna Museet; and the Royal Institute of Art and hosted by Mötesplats Mariatorget. Its title drawn from the eponymous 1990s electronic music hit by English band Depeche Mode, the series aims to present artistic perspectives from a wide range of media that are changing the relationship between material processes and socio-political imagination.