Erase the Silence

Archipelago
Apr 27 – June 2, 2024
10 Church Avenue, Germantown, New York
Open Saturday and Sunday, 12 – 4pm
Archipelago is pleased to present Erase the Silence, an exhibition comprised of new drawings by the Brazilian artist Antonio Obá. Within Obá’s artistic practice, the act of drawing is grounded in the realm of intuition. The artist, as if compelled by a wistful desire for form, moves from the expanded plane of the canvas to a place he describes as “rest.” Drawing emerges as an instinctive process, where a sequence of figures enact and dictate the work’s narrative. Paper becomes a cradle for the exquisite details present across the surface of his paintings, refiguring the practice of his research, making space for delicate symbolism.
The nebulous linework of his charcoal drawings introduces the nigredo in a poetic conception. The shadows, which appear innate at first sight, shift and decompose, giving shape to new images in a profoundly fluid way. These figures of fertility arise from an ended process of what they once were, representing the living in nature, now composed of dead matter, thus creating a kind of paradise in reverse.

¹ In alchemy, nigredo, or blackness, means putrefaction or decomposition. Many alchemists believed that as a first step in the pathway to the philosopher’s stone, all alchemical ingredients had to be cleansed and cooked extensively to a uniform black matter.
The artist’s devotion to form paves the way for liberation from historical bonds. Obá reworks imagery from anthropological encyclopedias that we now understand are records of ethnographic prejudice. The artist creates a new index of images that redress a historiography of failures. The nobility of the pietà; the warrior boy at attention, his gaze fixed upon the viewer; and many other details present a changed narrative where he, the figure of the savior or warrior, refuses to uphold the burdens which would historically be placed upon him. Serene, the figure can return to elements which have already lived in the lexicon of Obá, now able to embody a history that has been denied for so long.
In Erase the Silence, Antonio Obá celebrates his heroes and brings to light archetypes once informed by false objectivity. The artist’s deep imaginary gently reveals understandings lost by the prejudiced gaze. The images come from a narrative that reconfigures and transcends the canonical order and we are faced with a plot that makes them proponents of their own story, moving them away from the insidious terrain of sorrow and uncertainty. Through this process, there is no space for anything that is not impelled in the most honorable way through a search of form.
Antonio Obá investigates the influence and contradictions within the cultural construction of Brazil, giving rise to an act of resistance and reflection on the idea of national identity. Obá utilizes icons present in Brazilian culture as allusions to racial and political identity, these iconic historical and sometimes religious subjects are explored within his sculpture, painting, installations, and performance. Obá’s own body is central to his research, questioning the eroticization of the black male body and construction of his own identity.

Antonio Obá (b. 1983, Ceilândia, Brazil) lives and works in Brasília, Brazil.

He had has solo exhibitions at Pina Contemporânea, São Paulo, Brazil (2023); Oude Kerk, Amsterdam, Netherlands (2022); and X Museum, Beijing, China (2022). His work has been included in group exhibitions at 12th Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool, UK (2023); Museum de Fundatie, Zwolle, Netherlands (2023); MASP, São Paulo, Brazil (2022); Zeitz MOCAA, Cape Town, South Africa (2022); IMS Paulista, São Paulo, Brazil (2021); Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil (2021); Bourse de Commerce – Pinault Collection, Paris, France (2021); MO.CO, Montpellier, France (2020); Museu de Arte Moderna, São Paulo, Brazil (2019); Museu de Arte do Rio, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2018); Museu de Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2017);Casa da América Latina, Brasília, Brazil (2016); and Museu Nacional da República, Brasília, Brazil (2015).
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