Art and war seem like antagonistic words, but here they come together in this interesting set of 37 Afghan carpets from the personal collection of curator Victor Nosek. 

Held by the Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON), the exhibition "Afghanistan - carpets of peace and war" is based on MON's permanent collection of works. Unlike other cultural institutions, a museum's role, in addition to caring for and expanding its collection, is to create dialogues between its works and the exhibitions it holds. This is one of the Museum's proposals.

It is worth remembering that MON has the largest collection of Asian art in Latin America, following the donation of thousands of works years ago by diplomat and professor Fausto Godoy, which marked a new curatorial vocation. 

Space was then made in the collection for Asian, African and Latin American art, in line with the great museums of the world, making it distinct from the Eurocentric tendency that dominates Western culture. This initiative has positioned MON among the great international museums. 

In this vein, we are now bringing to our audience the ancient tradition of Afghan tapestry, which in recent decades has incorporated war themes into its traditional designs. Both themes are presented in this new exhibition, divided into two axes: peace and war.

More than appreciating the aesthetics, the show touches us by its proposal and leads us to perceive the world through the provocative gaze of denunciation. It offers visitors this unique experience of searching for meaning and reflecting on such a complex subject through the beauty of art.

Afghanistan is one of the most politically sensitive regions on the planet. Nestled between such diverse giants as Russia, India, Pakistan, Iran and China, its geographic location not only places it at the crossroads of great civilizations but also of some of the most important religions on the planet: Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, mainly.

Afghanistan is home to a very ancient civilization, which already existed as a Persian domain when Alexander III of Macedon, the Great, walked through the region and founded Balkh, one of his most advanced outposts in Asia, in 334 BCE. Part of the population still retains physical traces of their ancestral Greeks. This same population, with equally ancestral habits, is made up of a large cast of ethnic groups and tribes that resulted from the occupation by invaders of various origins – Persians, Greeks, Mongols, etc. – throughout their history, which have instilled, both genetically and in deep-rooted traditions, values ​​and concepts that each of them defends with fierce zeal.

Proud of their roots, these ethnic groups and tribes, which are divided between the Sunni and Shiite branches of Islam – approximately 90% are Sunni and 10% Shiite, roughly speaking – do not accept the preponderance of any other over them, no matter how large it may be in number, even though the Sunni Taliban, of the Pashtun ethnic group, currently dominate the government and public life and oppress other ethnic and religious groups. Afghans are even less accepting of interference from other cultures, and they remember the period when two of the largest empires of the 19th century, the Russian and the British, fought for hegemony over Central Asia in the region, which history has recorded as the “Great Game”.

It was this same spirit of resistance that was ignited in December 1979 when the Soviet Union, heeding the call of the communist government then in power in Afghanistan, invaded the country to support it in the fight against the mujahideen insurgents, made up of groups that rebelled against the oppression of the Marxist creed, which they understood to be a degradation of the values ​​of Islam. This was because the Soviets sought to impose their secular concepts, locked the mosques and prevented public worship. The resistance took on dramatic proportions when the Soviets abandoned Afghanistan in 1991, with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, leaving room for the intensification of confrontations between the hardened militants who had taken refuge in the mountains that make up the country's rugged geography. At the same time, Western troops from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), led by the United States, occupied the country after the attacks on the Twin Towers in New York on September 11, 2001, which, under the leadership of Osama bin Laden, were carried out by Al Qaeda, one of the most seasoned groups of the mujahideen.

After several political episodes that followed since then, with the departure of Western troops in August 2021, the Taliban came to power in Kabul. Part of the population that resists their designs has been seeking shelter in other parts of the planet, including Brazil, which already has around five thousand refugees.

"Afghanistan - rugs of peace and war" is the new project by the Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON), which is on display in the Eye Tower (first floor and second floor). The exhibition was curated by collector Victor Nosek, with the collaboration of professor and diplomat Fausto Godoy.

The exhibition brings together 37 rugs from Afghanistan depicting scenes of peace and war and reflecting different moments in the country's socio-political and cultural landscape. The exhibition also features 19 pieces of Afghan jewelry that are part of the daily life of the people from the regions where the rugs were made.

Afghan tribal war rugs are part of the "art as a portrait of war" tradition. 

They are a dramatic update of this tradition. They represented the Russo-Afghan war and have been produced by various semi-nomadic pastoral tribes, whose way of life remained unchanged for centuries. 

Weaved in the highlands when the snow melted, where Afghans had gone in search of pastures for their flocks, and in their permanent homes during the winter. 

The "living" carpets are the fruit of this way of life. 

The high-quality wool was dyed with natural dyes collected during the annual migration. Weavers, in the silence of their tents, free from interference, used simple horizontal looms fixed to the ground. The traditional themes, developed from memory, without prior drawing, are characteristic of each artist. Preferably created for their own use, the surplus is sold and the proceeds used to buy carnelian jewelry, stones used to ward off the evil eye. 

At first in timid appearances within the traditional themes, tanks, helicopters, jets and grenades soon occupied the entire composition. Tribal and contemporary, the war rugs in this exhibition belong to the first ten years of that war, between 1970-1980, when pastoral nomadism was still possible. The advent of endemic famine and the annihilation of the herds made nomadism and the resulting production of quality "living" carpets impossible! 

May this exhibition contribute to reflection and humanity finally achieve the peace and progress it is destined for! 

Victor Nosek 
Collection and Curatorship 

dec. 1980
Handwoven rug made on horizontal looms using sheep and camel wool dyed with natural pigments. Mane and tail hair from horses are used for the side cords
129 x 92 cm

dec. 1960/70
Handwoven rug made on horizontal looms using sheep and camel wool dyed with natural pigments. Mane and tail hair from horses are used for the side cords
210 x 109 cm

déc. 1980
Handwoven rug made on horizontal looms using sheep and camel wool dyed with natural pigments. Mane and tail hair from horses are used for the side cords
143 x 98 cm

dec. 1980
Handwoven rug made on horizontal looms using sheep and camel wool dyed with natural pigments. Mane and tail hair from horses are used for the side cords
152 x 92 cm

dec. 1960/70
Handwoven rug made on horizontal looms using sheep and camel wool dyed with natural pigments. Mane and tail hair from horses are used for the side cords
194 x 102 cm

"Afghanistan - rugs of peace and war" is the new project at the Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON). The exhibition can be seen from October 24 at the Eye Tower (first floor and second floor). The exhibition was curated by collector Victor Nosek, with the collaboration of professor and diplomat Fausto Godoy.

The exhibition brings together 37 rugs from Afghanistan depicting scenes of peace and war and reflecting different moments in the country's socio-political and cultural landscape. The exhibition will also feature 19 pieces of Afghan jewelry that are part of the daily life of the people in the regions where the rugs were made.

"Today, a museum is not just a place for preservation, but a space for dialog and reflection. The Oscar Niemeyer Museum exemplifies this role with a collection that ranges from art to historical and anthropological items, expanding the physical barriers of what a museum space is," says Luciana Casagrande Pereira, Paraná's Secretary of State for Culture. 

"Our aim is also to broaden cultural references. In this way, MON highlights the richness of Asian and African cultures, which make up one of the largest specialized collections in the Americas, presented both in long-term exhibitions and in itinerant exhibitions throughout Paraná," says the secretary.

MON director Juliana Vosnika says that the exhibition is an opportunity for visitors to see the ancient tradition of Afghan tapestry up close. "It's worth remembering that MON has the largest collection of Asian art in Latin America, following the donation of thousands of works years ago by diplomat and professor Fausto Godoy, which marked a new curatorial vocation," he says. 

Space was then made in the collection for Asian, African and Latin American art, in line with the great museums of the world, making it distinct from the Eurocentric tendency that dominates Western culture. This initiative has positioned the Oscar Niemeyer Museum among the great international museums. 

"In this vein, we are now bringing to our audience the ancient tradition of Afghan tapestry, which in recent decades has incorporated war themes into its traditional designs," says Juliana. Both themes are presented in this new exhibition, divided into two axes: peace and war.

Fausto Godoy, who served as Brazil's ambassador to Afghanistan for around two years, talks about the political importance of the exhibition, and curator Victor Nosek explains that the rugs that reflect the theme of peace are the oldest, and represent pastoral scenes, nature in general or geometric shapes. 

Tribal and contemporary, the war rugs reflect the period between 1970-1980 and will be exhibited separately on the second floor of the Tower. "We need to look at them, perceive that aesthetic and reflect on how it is possible to create beauty in war," says Godoy.

He points out that Afghanistan is one of the most politically sensitive regions on the planet. "Nestled between giants as diverse as Russia, India, Pakistan, Iran and China, its geographical location not only places it at the crossroads of great civilizations, but also of some of the most important religions on the planet: Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, in particular," he says.

The collector and curator of the exhibition explains that Afghan tribal war rugs are part of the tradition: art as a portrait of war. "They are a dramatic update of this tradition," says Nosek. 

According to him, these pieces represent the early years of the Russo-Afghan war and were produced by different semi-nomadic pastoral tribes, whose way of life remained unchanged for centuries. "May this exhibition contribute to reflection and humanity finally achieve the peace and progress to which it is destined," says the curator.

Afghanistan - rugs of peace and war

MON is alongside major museums in Brazil and around the world on the Google Arts & Culture platform. Visit our exhibitions in virtual format. 

Find out more about this exhibition on the Google Arts & Culture platform.

With each new exhibition, the Oscar Niemeyer Museum invites its public to be surprised. This time, Mexican artist Gabriel de la Mora challenges our gaze and perception with his paintings, installations and sculptures made from unusual, discarded items. 

Nothing in his intense and extensive work is obvious. This includes everything from the peculiar materials he uses to the execution processes and inspiration. Everything is the result of an insight into human nature, its feelings and sensations. 

In his creative process, he transforms found objects into raw material for unique works of art, evoking the concept of ready-made. There is always a message, addressing sustainability, the passage of time and the cycle of life, translated into works full of beauty and movement.

Upon entering the exhibition room, the public is confronted not only with works of art, but with a proposal to create new meanings. By discussing universal environmental issues, he makes us realize the many possibilities that art can take on. 

The result, although the result of a process of research and study, with great technical complexity, leaves no room for predictability and sounds intuitive. We are challenged to perceive something beyond the works. And that's what this exhibition invites us to do.

Juliana Vellozo Almeida Vosnika
CEO of the Oscar Niemeyer Museum

MON holds exhibition by Mexican Gabriel de la Mora

The exhibition “Veemente”, by the Mexican artist Gabriel de la Mora, is the Oscar Niemeyer Museum's (MON) newest project. The show, on display in Room 1 from May 8th, is curated by Marcello Dantas. There are 70 works, including installations, canvases with mixed techniques and sculptures, most produced between 2000 and 2025. 

The set shows not only the artist's aesthetic and its evolution, but also the diversity and peculiarity of the materials used, which go beyond traditional supports and pigments. In his creative process, he transforms found objects into raw material for unique works of art, evoking the concept of ready-made.

Gabriel de la Mora's practice involves an investigation into materials, exploring the physical and conceptual limits of a process of collection and reconstruction. At first glance, his works may seem abstract, sculptural or even minimalist. However, a closer look reveals that nothing is as it seems. De la Mora creates new and extraordinary surfaces that deconstruct the boundaries between different artistic languages.

His works are made up of unexpected elements: strands of hair, fragments of mirrors, eggshells, shoe soles, butterfly wings and other traces of everyday life. His technique denotes an almost obsessive process that transforms the raw material into new shapes, patterns and textures. The continuous repetition of the artisanal gesture - sometimes restorative, sometimes destructive - reveals a method that challenges the viewer's visual and sensory experience.

Gabriel de la Mora was born in Mexico in 1968 and surprised the art world by treating any material as an object of interest and creative power. His work aims to assign new symbolic and aesthetic values to the banal. As a collector of fragments of everyday life, he shows an unlimited fascination with the remnants of existence, putting together a puzzle that never existed.

This obsession with repetition and reconstruction is what defines the vehemence of his practice. In an exhaustive process, he seeks a visual expression that can only emerge from the infinite persistence of the gesture. 

The exhibition's expography reflects the artist's material obsessiveness by proposing an expanded sensory experience. At the Oscar Niemeyer Museum in Curitiba, a 400 m² room is filled with his works, while a large central table allows visitors to explore the materials of his creations.

The role of art is to transform the value of things - symbolic, material or imaginary. "Veemente" is an equation of visual and tactile perceptions. By allowing the public to interact with the materials and experiment with the limits of repetition and obsession, the exhibition invites each visitor to experience, in an intimate and sensory way, the logic of an artist who turns waste into visual poetry.

820 Fragments of Hypolimnas pandarus butterfly wings on museum cardboard
30 x 30 x 2 cm
Simões de Assis Gallery

Wooden sticks
28.6 x 22.3 x 15 cm
Private collection

Electronic panels on museum paper
41 x 35 x 4 cm
Private collection

Dust collected in the artist's studio
10 x 10 x 10 cm
Private collection

Acrylic on peacock feathers on museum cardboard
30 x 30 x 4 cm
Private collection

The exhibition “Veemente”, by the Mexican artist Gabriel de la Mora, is the Oscar Niemeyer Museum's (MON) newest project. The exhibition will open on May 8 in Room 1, curated by Marcello Dantas.

There are 70 works, including installations, canvases with mixed techniques and sculptures, most produced between 2000 and 2025. The set shows not only the artist's aesthetic and its evolution, but also the diversity and peculiarity of the materials used, which go beyond traditional supports and pigments. 

"Gabriel de la Mora's art provokes a fundamental reflection on our time and invites us to reframe the ordinary, to look more closely at what we have discarded or forgotten," says the Secretary of State for Culture, Luciana Casagrande Pereira. "It's an exhibition that dialogues with contemporary themes and reinforces MON's commitment to bringing the public powerful experiences connected to global art discussions."

MON's director Juliana Vosnika says that the artist challenges our gaze and perception with his paintings, installations and sculptures made from unusual, discarded items. "Nothing in his intense and extensive work is obvious. Everything is the result of an insight into human nature, its feelings and sensations," she says. 

In the process of creation, the artist transforms found objects into raw material for unique works of art, evoking the concept of ready-made. "There is always a message, addressing sustainability, the passage of time and the cycle of life, translated into works full of beauty and movement," says Juliana.

Curator Marcello Dantas explains that Gabriel de la Mora's practice involves an investigation into materials, exploring the physical and conceptual limits of a process of collection and reconstruction. "At first glance, his works may seem abstract, sculptural or even minimalist. However, a closer look reveals that nothing is as it seems," says Dantas. 

"His works are made up of unexpected elements: strands of hair, fragments of mirrors, eggshells, shoe soles, butterfly wings and other traces of everyday life," says the curator. "His technique denotes an almost obsessive process that transforms the raw material into new shapes, patterns and textures. The continuous repetition of the artisanal gesture - sometimes restorative, sometimes destructive - reveals a method that challenges the viewer's visual and sensory experience," he says.

Marcello Dantas is an award-winning curator who has worked extensively in Brazil and abroad. He works on the border between art and technology, producing exhibitions and multiple projects that provide immersive experiences through the senses and perception. In recent years, he has worked on the design of several museums, such as the Museum of the Portuguese Language, Japan House (SP), Museum of Nature (PI), Museum of the City of Manaus, Museum of the People from Sergipe (Aracaju, SE), Museum of the Caribbean and the Carnival Museum (Barranquilla, Colombia). He has held solo exhibitions of some of the world's most important names in contemporary art, such as Ai Weiwei, Anish Kapoor, Laurie Anderson, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Rebecca Horn and Tunga. He was also the artistic director of the Brazil Pavilion at Expo Shanghai 2010, the Brazil Pavilion at Rio+20 and the Pelé Station in Berlin for the 2006 World Cup.

Born in 1968 in Mexico City, where he lives and works, Gabriel de La Mora has a degree in Architecture from the University Anáhuac del Norte and has a master's degree in painting from the Pratt Institute in New York. He focuses his artistic practice on the use and reuse of discarded or obsolete objects, which seem to have completed their useful life. More interested in the deconstruction and fragmentation of an object or material over time, he bets on reconstruction from practices based on the passage of time and processes, echoing the ready-made concept.

Veemente - Gabriel de la Mora

MON holds an exhibition of African art with pieces recently incorporated into its collection

The exhibition "Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent", held by the Oscar Niemeyer Museum, presented by Copel and made possible by the government of the State of Paraná, can be seen by the public from August 31 in Room 4. It is a selection of the significant donation made by the Ivani and Jorge Yunes Collection (CIJY) to the MON.

There are approximately 1,700 works from one of the most significant collections of African art objects from the 20th century, which now belong to the Oscar Niemeyer Museum collection and, consequently, to the State of Paraná.

Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent

“Turn a tree into firewood and it will burn; but it will never give you flowers and fruit again.”

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), Bengali poet

The ancient metaphor of fertility related to the vital force and potency of trees, with their deep roots, their stem as a foundation, their ramifications as unfoldings of themselves, their legacy as symbolic flowers and fruits, was never more adequate as to be applied to the permanent links with our Mother Africa. If we then think of the metaphors of the gigantic baobab tree, from the more severe historical references associated with slavery by the so-called “tree of oblivion” to the milder ones, such as the famous tree in the book The Little Prince, the lessons arising therefrom would be analogous: “You become eternally responsible for what you captivate”, as Saint-Exupéry said.

If artistic expressions arise from the senses, the legacy of civilizations arises from the hands; and how beautiful are the manifestations of peoples, how beautiful are the arts of Africa! The love and yearning for the beautiful, the love and fear of nature and the gods and the fearless appreciation of civilization were so dear to African nations that they indistinctly distributed and reputed all aspects of existence, contradictory or not, some form of artistic expression.

The arts demarcate the forms of a time. The long-term exhibition “Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent” thus presents one of the essential points of the transition in the development of older African arts, since their withdrawal from the continent and the subsequent decontextualization of their intrinsic meanings, seen in the modern and contemporary world from an emphasis on their artistic forms. Previously restricted to European museums as objects of so-called traditional millenary cultures, today the works bequeathed from Africa have been able to conform to today's artistic work, offering the so-called “traditional contemporary African art” to the whole world, as it is known by specialists. These works are instruments of recent and authentic modernization of African popular arts or even modern reproductions of ancient pieces destined mainly for emerging markets in the tropics.

Strengthening institutional ties, the Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON) received this important donation of African works from the Ivani and Jorge Yunes Collection (CIJY). Over more than fifty years, the couple has acquired works that span five continents. This donation includes around 1700 objects from Africa: masks, statuettes, busts, miniatures, everyday objects, musical instruments and a large number of other pieces. In a positive way, they are now part of the Oscar Niemeyer Museum collection, which we congratulate for having taken this opportune step, enriching its collection and, at the same time, the entire African legacy in Paraná and Brazil. We invite everyone to take an active part in this immersion in African art, observing its forms in what they themselves may surprise and allow an equivalent enjoyment to others in the artistic universe, without watertight determinations, taking this dialogue a step further. 

From the great tree of Africa, multiple fruits and new legacies were generated. It was no coincidence that, like most sub-Saharan peoples, the Assyrians, the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, the Mayans, the Incas, the Aztecs and basically all the great civilizations developed a culture of wearing masks and made representations in sculpture . With the exhibition of objects from such different cultural heritages, we find here an important point in common: within the museum, these arts are elevated to the same artistic platform, equaling African art to the level of world art. Here is a way to honor the visual ancestry of the past and to open up the new plantings, routes and perspectives of this art in the future.

Renato Araújo da Silva
Curator and Specialist in African Art

The exhibition “Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent”, held by the Oscar Niemeyer Museum, presented by Copel, can be seen by the public from August 26th, in Room 4. It is an excerpt from the great donation made by the Ivani and Jorge Collection Yunes (CIJY) to MON.

"The arrival of the African art collection is part of a consolidation process of MON's frame of reference. It establishes as a differential of the institution to primarily collect Brazilian and Paraná art and expand its non-Eurocentric look to Latin American, Asian and African art," explains Juliana Vosnika, director-president of MON. "We are constantly seeking to increase the collection because that is the soul of a museum, its essence," she says.

Juliana recalls that, in 2018, MON was the museum chosen for its technical conditions, management capacity, and credibility to receive a donation of almost 3,000 works of Asian art. Donated by diplomat and professor Fausto Godoy and coming from several countries of that continent, part of the works can be seen by MON visitors in the exhibition "Asia: the Earth, the Men, the Gods" in Room 5.

The largest art museum in Latin America inbuilt area, with 35,000 square meters, MON has tripled its collection in recent years. Since it opened in 2002 and until 2015, MON had about 3,000 works of art. Today, it has more than 9,300 works in its collection.

According to the curator of the exhibition "Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent," Renato Araújo da Silva, the works donated to MON were acquired over more than 50 years by the couple Ivani and Jorge Yunes, owners of one of the largest art collections in Brazil.

"With the exhibition of objects from such distinct cultural heritages, we find here an important common point: within the Museum, these arts are elevated to the same artistic platform, equaling African art to the level of world art," he says. "Here is a way to honor the visual ancestry of the past and to open the new plantings, routes, and perspectives of this art in the future," comments Renato.

The exhibition includes masks, sculptures, bronze busts and heads, metal miniatures, everyday objects, and musical instruments.

The works come from countries like the Ivory Coast, Mali, Nigeria, Cameroon, Gabon, Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Mozambique, among others.

Renato Araújo da Silva is a historian in Philosophy from the University of São Paulo and coauthor, among other published works, of the book "Africa in Arts." Curator and researcher, he has worked at the Afro Museum and held other exhibitions in museums, such as the Sacred Art Museum of São Paulo.

"Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent”
Room 4

folder-africa-en.pdf

ÁFRICA - EXPRESSÕES ARTÍSTICAS DE UM CONTINENTE

The exhibition “Africa, Artistic Expressions of a Continent” is a part of the donation of approximately 1,700 pieces of contemporary African art, from the partnership between MON and the Ivani and Jorge Yunes Collection. Watch a message from the exhibition's curator, Renato Araújo, and visit Room 4 at MON. Exhibition presented by COPEL@copel_energia. #ArteAfricana#MuseuOscarNiemeyer

África, Artistic Expressions of a Continent at MON!

África, Expressões Artísticas de um Continente no MON!

África, Expressões Artísticas de Um Continente. O nascer de um novo legado para a arte, para você.  ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀  Em cartaz na Sala 4 do Museu Oscar Niemeyer.  ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀  Exposição apresentada pela COPEL @copel_energia. #MuseuOscarNiemeyer#ÁfricaNoMON

#emcartaz | África, Expressões Artísticas de Um Continente

#emcartaz | África, Expressões Artísticas de Um Continente

MON is alongside major museums in Brazil and around the world on the Google Arts & Culture platform. Visit our exhibitions in virtual format.

Learn more about this exhibition on the Google Arts & Culture platform.

For the Oscar Niemeyer Museum, art and artists from Paraná play an important role and are always present in exhibitions and in the institution's permanent collection.

Here, visitors will be able to see a cross-section of Curitiba artist Teca Sandrini's work, from the 1960s to the present day. Her exhibition "Eterno Feminino", held by MON, brings together more than 100 paintings, drawings, prints and sculptures. 

With great sensitivity, she portrays women in different ways, in different contexts and times, as well as their feelings, sensations and emotions.

Artists often give clues, through their work, about the way they see life. Teca has always been an attentive observer of the world around her, which is clear, implicitly and explicitly, in her work. 

The result is a vast production, which has already been presented in cities throughout Brazil and the world and is part of various collections. 

Museums are living spaces of knowledge whose mission is to promote a constant dialog between artists and the public. By bringing this artist's exhibition to the locals and to all visitors, MON provides belonging and appreciation of local culture.

Juliana Vellozo Almeida Vosnika
CEO of the Oscar Niemeyer Museum

- Teca Sandrini was born on April 9th in Curitiba. Daughter of Stella Braga and José Ernesto Erichsen Pereira.

- She joined the school Colégio Nossa Senhora de Sion.

- She joined Colégio São José, where she finished high school.

- She began attending the free painting course run by Guido Viaro, who kept his studio in the attic of the Paraná School of Music and Fine Arts (EMBAP) in Curitiba. 

- She joined the painting course at EMBAP.

- She won an award at the 9th Salon of Plastic Arts for New People, organized by the Paraná Department of Education and Culture, in Curitiba. 

- He began working as a librarian's assistant at the Paraná Public Library.

- She won awards at the 10th Salon of Plastic Arts for New Talents, organized by the Paraná Department of Education and Culture; and at Salão Arte Primavera, held at the Concórdia Club in Curitiba.

- She won an award at the 1st EMBAP Academic Directory Show. 

- She participated in the group exhibition Decorative Art, at EMBAP.

- She graduated in Didactics of Drawingfrom the Faculty of Philosophy of the Catholic University of Paraná.

- Her daughter, Giovanna Sandrini Berberi, was born.

- She began her teaching career teaching drawing at the Maria Aguiar Teixeira State School in Curitiba.

- She attended the studio of sculptor Juan Carlos Labourdette in Buenos Aires. 

-She took ceramics classes with Gladys C. de Migliorini, also in Buenos Aires.

- Her son, Juliano Pereira Sandrini, was born.

- She took part in the group exhibition Resin and Metal, at the Curitiba Creativity Center. 

- She is part of the first group of artisans to set up shop at the Largo da Ordem market in Curitiba.

- She began teaching ceramics and sculpture at the Curitiba Creativity Center, where she remained until 1978.

- She participated in the course Art and Creativity, taught by Tom Hudson, at the Curitiba Creativity Center. 

- She taught the Resin Workshop, at the Exhibition Hall of the Paraná Development Bank (BADEP), in Curitiba.

- She took part in the courses Initiation to the Plastic Arts, with the critic Roberto Pontual, at the Guido Viaro Museum; and Bronze Sculpture with the sculptor Francisco Stockinger, at the Curitiba Creativity Center. 

- She organized and took part in the exhibition Tapeçarias , with drawings by artists from the Curitiba Creativity Centre and weavings by inmates from the Piraquara Women's Penitentiary, at the Curitiba Cultural Foundation headquarters. 

- In Curitiba, he took part in the group exhibitions Artes Técnicas , at BADEP; and Orientadores do Centro de Criatividade, at the Cultural Foundation headquarters.

- She took part in a ceramics course with ceramist Marek Cecula at the Curitiba Creativity Center. 

She held her first solo exhibition at the Curitiba Cultural Foundation, presenting sculptures in polyester resin.

- She took part in the group exhibitions Esculturas em Bronze , at the Curitiba Cultural Foundation headquarters; and Collective of the Curitiba Creativity Center, at the Joinville Art Museum (SC).

- She began voluntary work as an art teacher at the Paraná Women's Penitentiary, where she worked until 1983. 

- She organized the 3rd Tapestry Exhibition, by inmates of the Piraquara Women's Penitentiary, at the Curitiba Cultural Foundation. 

- She took part in the group exhibition Orientadores do Centro de Criatividade de Curitiba, at Casa da Cultura in Joinville (SC); and, in Curitiba, in the group exhibitions Arte e Pensamento Ecológico, at the Centro de Criatividade, and 2nd Exhibition of Art and Artistic Techniques , at BADEP. 

- She took part in the collective exhibitions Novas Tendências , at the Joinville Art Museum (SC); and Panorama da Arte no Paraná - IV Artistas Contemporâneos, at BADEP, in Curitiba.

- She began working as a cultural affairs technician at the Paraná Department of Culture and Sport, where she worked, among other things, on the production of exhibitions, competitions and fairs.

- She won an award at the 7th Jacarezinho Plastic Arts Exhibition, organized by the Paraná Department of Culture and Sport, in Jacarezinho (PR).

- She won awards at the 4th Iguaçu Art Salon, run by the Paraná Department of Culture and Sport, in Foz do Iguaçu (PR); and at the 1st Assis Plastic Arts Salon, run by SESC and the Assis City Hall (SP).

- She started as a teaching assistant in the Industrial Design course at the Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná (PUC-PR).

- Participated in the group exhibition Artists from Ohio's Brazilian Sister States Paraná, at the Hiestand Gallery, Miami University, Oxford; and at the N.O.V.A. Gallery, in Cleveland, Ohio (USA).

- She won an award at the 34th Plastic Arts Salon of Pernambuco, organized by the Recife Department of Tourism, Culture and Sports. 

- She won an award at the <401>1st Mini-Painting Exhibition</401>, held by the Syrian-Lebanese Club of Paraná, in Curitiba. 

- She took part, as a special guest, in the 3rd Assis Plastic Arts Exhibition, in Assis (SP).

- She organized the exhibitions Arte é Liberdade and Manufatura de Tapeçaria da Penitenciária Feminina de Piraquara (Tapestry Manufacturing at the Piraquara Women's Penitentiary)at Sala Bandeirante de Cultura in Curitiba, with works by inmates.

- Together with Ennio Marques Ferreira, she organized the exhibition Miniquadros das Internas da Penitenciária Feminina de Piraquara (Mini-painting of the inmates of the Piraquara Women's Penitentiary), at Clube Sírio Libanês do Paraná, in Curitiba.

- She took part in the group exhibitions Coletiva de Desenho, at Galeria Rodrigo Mello Franco de Andrade (FUNARTE/INAP), in Rio de Janeiro; Free Art Box Partners of the Americas, in Ohio (USA); and, in the Miguel Bakun Room of the Paraná Public Library, the group exhibitions Registro da Escultura Paranaense de Hoje and Caixa Arte Livre.

- She held the exhibition Dois Artistas Paranaenses , at Banco Itaú Gallery, in São Paulo and Campo Grande. 

- She took part in the group exhibitions Eight Artists from Paraná, at the Museum of Modern Art of Bahia, in Salvador; and Paranaenser Kuenstler Stellen in der Schweiz Aus, at the Aarau Museum of Art (Switzerland). 

- She won awards at the 2nd Mini-painting Exhibition, of Clube Sírio Libanês do Paraná; and at the 40th Salão Paranaense, of Paraná Department of Culture and Sport, in Curitiba. 

- She began specializing in Philosophical Anthropology at the Federal University of Paraná (UFPR). 

- She in the university extension course Existentialism and Marxism, also at UFPR. 

- The exhibition Estela Sandriniwas held at Caixa de Criação Art Gallery in Curitiba. 

- She took part in the group exhibitions Artists of Paraná, at the Armando Álvares Penteado Foundation (FAAP), in São Paulo; and Current Values of Paraná, at FUNARTE's Macunaíma Gallery, in Rio de Janeiro. 

- She won an award at the 6th Brazilian Drawing Exhibition, organized by the Paraná Department of Culture and Sport, in Curitiba. 

- She took part in the group exhibitions Velha Mania, at Parque Lage School of Visual Arts, in Rio de Janeiro; and Traço e Volume, at Museu de Arte Brasileira (FAAP), in São Paulo, and at the Museu de Arte de Santa Catarina, in Florianópolis. 

- She won an award at the National Fine Arts Salonat the Goiânia Art Museum. 

- The exhibition Estela Sandriniwas held at the Poupança Banestado Art Gallery in Londrina (PR). 

- She took part in the group exhibition Tradition/Contradiction, curated by Maria José Justino, at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Paraná (MAC-PR), as an artist and researcher.

- She was part of the group exhibitions Art and Peace, at the Teatro Guaíra exhibition hall, in Curitiba; Paraná Color and Form, at the National Museum of Fine Arts, in Rio de Janeiro; Paths of Brazilian Drawing, at the Museum of Arts of Rio Grande do Sul, in Porto Alegre; and Arte 13 de Curitiba, at FAAP, in São Paulo.

- She was awarded prizes at the 43rd Paranaense Salon, run by Paraná Department of Culture and Sport; and at the 7th Printmaking Exhibition, run by the Curitiba City Print Museum. 

- She has held the exhibitions Estela Sandrini and Guita Soifer, at the Santa Catarina Museum of Art, in Florianópolis; and Small and Large Images by Estela Sandrini, at Imagem 3 Escritório de Arte, in Curitiba. 

- He took part in the group exhibitions Homage to Printmaking - Exhibitions of Printmaking Biennial Award Winners, at Galeria Arte Correa, in Curitiba; Art on Paper, at the Goiânia Art Museum; and Curitiba Young Engravers Exhibition , at FAAP (São Paulo), Fundação Cultural do Distrito Federal (Brasília) and Museu de Arte de Santa Catarina (Florianópolis).

- She was part of the technical guidance team led by Maria José Justino for the creation and formation of the collection of the Paraná Art Museum (MAP). 

- She moved to Baltimore, Maryland (USA).

- She took painting courses with Dan Dudrow and monotype courses with Sam Peters at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore.

- She held the exhibition From Brazil: Estela Sandrini, at the Katzenstein Gallery in Baltimore.

- She held the exhibition Estela Sandrini: Paintings and Drawings, at the Art Gallery of Brazilian American Cultural Institute, Washington, D.C. (USA).

- She cofounded the Maryland Printmakers group.

- In Maryland, she participated in the group exhibitions Les Femmes des Arts, at the Eubie Blake Cultural Center, in Baltimore; Maryland Printmakers, at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, in Princess Anne; and Maryland Printmakers, at the Daedal Fine Arts Gallery, in Fallston Mall.

“Eterno Feminino” is a selection of the work of Curitiba-based artist Teca Sandrini, from the 1960s to the present day, curated by Maria José Justino, on display in Sala 7. The paintings, drawings, engravings and sculptures present three phases of her career: “Polacas”, “Fragmentos” and “Manchas”. The first addresses signs of domestic life by showing women doing their daily chores. In the “Fragmentos” phase, flirting with surrealism and abstraction, the focus is on drawers and chairs. In the most recent phase, “Manchas”, the artist plays with shapes.

This exhibition consolidates Teca Sandrini's preference for painting as an oblique language about reality, a knowledge that speaks through the silence of women, their longings and daydreams. In the various techniques and languages she experimented with, the diagonal structure was always present, which the Baroque saw as the best way to express movement and life. 

Apart from the transition zones, Sandrini has at least three major phases. In POLACAS, the fat, young lady, reclusive inside a square and surrounded on all sides by junk, signs of everyday domestic life, oscillates between the naive and the scathing. They are women immersed in their tasks, in their junk - pots, pans, drawers - in an organized madness. Neither heroines nor victims, just housewives bogged down in routine chores. 

Later, in a flirtation with surrealism, animals intertwine with human beings, who gradually fade away and give way to the object until, finally, they give themselves up. In the saturation of objects, Teca feels the need to empty herself... This is the  FRAGMENTS. phase The woman hides and gives way to drawers and chairs - a place of secrets, safekeeping and waiting. 

A flirtation with abstraction emerges. But not pure abstraction - the emotional side of the expressionist doesn't disappear. She exchanges the female form and the animals for the violence of colors and the concentration on the fragment. 

The galloping difficulty of vision inaugurates MANCHAS phase, in which the artist allows herself to play with shapes. The concrete and the geometric merge with the emotions of life, dressed in stains, spontaneity and expressiveness, approaching all over. Strong colors give way to large stains and, in the lights that go out, white sprouts as light. A new, non-narrative painting emerges. 

Today's Teca is outlined in stains. Apart from the journey through the Marias, which seem to be a concert with all the women of the past, her paintings are reminiscences of life. You have to lose the earthly paradise to truly experience it, said Bachelard. The loss of part of the sight sharpens the gaze and intensifies the desire to see the world. Her painting continues to be the exercise of a profane religion, because it is immersed in the world; ontological, because it is immersed in the immensity of the language of art; intimate - and therefore true. Metaphor of resistance, poetics of the gaze, praise of the hand. 

Oil on canvas
300 x 300 cm (cada 150 x  150) quadríptico
Teca Sandrini collection

Crayon, India ink and oil paint on paper
Variable dimensions
Teca Sandrini collection

Oil on canvas
130 x 160 cm
Teca Sandrini collection

India ink and oil pastel on paper
73 x 105 cm
Teca Sandrini collection

Oscar Niemeyer Museum opens exhibition by artist Teca Sandrini

A cross-section of the work of Curitiba artist Teca Sandrini, from the 1960s to the present day, is brought together in the exhibition "Eterno Feminino", inaugurated by the Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON). There are 126 paintings, drawings, prints and sculptures, curated by Maria José Justino, which will be in Room 7 from July 3rd at 7pm.

"Valuing the production of artists from Paraná, especially women with trajectories as powerful as Teca Sandrini's, is to reaffirm our commitment to the memory, diversity and strength of the art made in Paraná," says the Secretary of State for Culture, Luciana Casagrande Pereira.

"Art and artists from Paraná play an important role and are always present in exhibitions and in MON's permanent collection," says the institution's director, Juliana Vosnika. "By exhibiting this artist, the Oscar Niemeyer Museum is fostering belonging and appreciation of local culture," says Juliana.

The curator explains that the exhibition consolidates Teca Sandrini's preference for painting "as an oblique language about reality, a knowledge that speaks through the silence of women, their longings and daydreams". According to Maria José Justino, "in the various techniques and languages she experimented with, the diagonal structure was always present, which the Baroque saw as the best way to express movement and life".

The exhibition brings together works from three distinct phases in the artist's career: "Polacas", "Fragmentos" and "Manchas". The first addresses signs of everyday domestic life by presenting housewives carrying out routine tasks. "Later, in a flirtation with surrealism and abstraction, the woman hides and gives way to drawers and chairs - a place of secrets, of being kept and of waiting, this is the 'Fragmentos' phase," explains the curator.

The limitations and difficulties of the artist's vision inaugurate the most recent phase of her work, that of "Manchas", in which she plays with shapes. "Concrete matter and geometry merge with the emotions of life, dressed up in stains, spontaneity and expressiveness," says Maria José Justino. "Strong colors give way to large stains and, in the lights that go out, white springs up like light. A new painting emerges, not a narrative," she says. 

With an artistic career spanning more than six decades, Teca Sandrini says that art has made her a citizen of the world. "From life and art I bring loves, colors and perfumes," she says. "I feel that art is like nature, where the visible and the invisible intertwine and narrate reality and memory," she says.

Maria José Justino is a teacher, essayist, curator and art critic. She has a master's degree in Philosophy from PUC-SP, a post-doctorate from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (2008) and a doctorate from the University of Paris VIII (1991) in Aesthetics and the Sciences of the Arts. She is a member of the Culture Council of the State of Paraná, at the Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON) and the Museum of Contemporary Art (MAC). A retired professor from UFPR and Embap, she is the author of more than 70 articles and books, among them: “Mulheres na Arte: Que Diferença Isso Faz?”, “Frans Krajcberg: A Tragicidade da Natureza pelo Olhar da Arte”, and “Modernidade e Pós-modernidade em Hélio Oiticica”.

Teca Sandrini is an award-winning Brazilian artist with works in various national and international collections. She has a degree in Painting from the School of Music and Fine Arts of Paraná, a degree in Drawing from the Faculty of Philosophy of the Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná (PUCPR), and a specialization in Philosophical Anthropology from the Federal University of Paraná (UFPR). He has held solo exhibitions in several Brazilian cities and in other countries such as the United States and Germany. She taught at the Paraná School of Music and Fine Arts and at PUCPR.

Her works belong to important collections such as: Oscar Niemeyer Museum, Collection of the Brazilian American, Cultural Institute, Washington D.C., (USA); Museum of Brazilian Art - Armando Alvares Penteado Foundation, São Paulo; Museum of Contemporary Art of Pernambuco, Olinda (PE); Museum of Contemporary Art of Paraná, Curitiba; Museum of Modern Art of Santa Catarina, Florianópolis; Museum of Art of Goiânia; National Museum of Fine Arts, Rio de Janeiro; and several others.

The Oscar Niemeyer Museum (MON) is a state heritage site linked to the State Secretariat for Culture. The institution houses important references of national and international artistic production in the areas of visual arts, architecture and design, as well as large Asian and African collections. In total, the collection has approximately 14,000 works of art, housed in a space of more than 35,000 square meters, making MON the largest art museum in Latin America.

Exhibition "Eterno Feminino" - Teca Sandrini
Opening: July 3rd, 7pm
Spaces: Room 7
www.museuoscarniemeyer.org.br

Eterno Feminino - Teca Sandrini

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