Contemporary art in Rio Grande do Sul.

Rio Grande do Sul is the Southernmost state in Brazil, bordering Uruguay and Argentina, with a population of 10 million, 1.5 million of whom live in the State capital Porto Alegre, which is one of the most developed cities in South America with a high rating on the Human Development Index.

Some 1100 kilometres from São Paulo and 1500 kilometres from Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre is in many respects still a provincial city. The local identity and culture of Rio Grande do Sul are strong, and in many ways somewhat conservatively independent in relation to the rest of the country, although the period of the Workers Party control of both city and state in the 1990s and early 2000s brought some radical changes and greater recognition on an international stage.

Contemporary art production and conditions for display and consumption have varied over recent years, with the 1980s being seen as a particularly strong period for the development of commercial galleries and artist sales. The 1970s saw the emergence of two important artist-led initiatives, Nervo Óptico and Espaço N.O., aimed at broadening awareness of international contemporary art practices in Porto Alegre. Many young artists achieved early success in the late 1980s and early 1990s, often moving to São Paulo to further their careers. The artist Iberê Camargo was an important figure in the development of the arts in the state, campaigning tirelessly for better conditions for artists and the removal of taxes on import of art materials and the circulation of artworks, and also founding the city's Atelier Livre da Prefeitura. The economic conditions of the 1990s brought a downturn in the art market and weakening state and municipal support for the arts. Federal and state cultural incentive legislation in the past decade has led to improvements in funding for some institutions and facilitated the emergence of non-profit institutions such as the Iberê Camargo Foundation  and the Mercosul Biennial.

Artist-led initiatives continue through such organisation as Atelier Subterrânea and 3x4 The major centre for the arts is the state capital, although important production also emerges from other centres such as Pelotas, Caxias do Sul and Santa Maria, all of which have their own universities.

Porto Alegre is home to the major art institutions in the state, including the state-funded Museum of Art of Grande do Sul , Casa de Cultura Mario Quintana , the Museum of Contemporary Art ; the city-funded Usina do Gasômetro, Atelier Livre da Prefeitura, Paço Municipal; corporate-funded Santander Cultural; independent /private spaces Museo do Trabalho , Iberê Camargo Foundation, and Mercosul Biennial; artist-run spaces Fundação Vera Chaves Barcellos, Subterrânea, Torreão; and commercial galleries Bolsa de Arte, and Galeria Gestual.

The major art-education institutions in the state are the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul Arts Institute, in Porto Alegre, Federal University of Santa Maria, Federal University of Pelotas, University of Caxias do Sul, and Feevale, in Novo Hamburgo. Art courses are also taught at the city-run Atelier Livre da Prefeitura, a studio complex offering classes to the local community of Porto Alegre. Short courses are sometimes run in the education department of the Museum of Art of Rio Grande do Sul. Major school education programmes are offered by the Iberê Camargo Foundation and the Mercosul Biennial Foundation.

Public incentives for the arts include the annual municipal Açorianos Award for the best work in a wide range of creative fields from community arts to dance and cinema, and the municipal Fumproarte funding awards for cultural production.

The UFRGS Art Institute was founded on the initiative of a group of artists and teachers over 100 years ago, who even mortgaged their homes to acquire the premises. Located in Porto Alegre city centre, it now runs from a somewhat overcrowded, rather ramshackle 7-storey building, and is the one of the major centres for undergraduate and postgraduate art education and research in the country. As a federal university, students pay no tuition fees and admission is by university entrance examination and a simple drawing test. Postgraduate application is by submission of a proposal and portfolio. As the only non-fee institution, competition for places is high. Students come from a range of backgrounds, but as secondary school art education is virtually non-existent except for some private schools, the standard of intake is generally low. University lecturers often find themselves having to start from the very basics of drawing skills and art history with students whose idea of art may be to copy a picture of a cat from a magazine, for example. Huge progress is made to bring students to degree level at the end of their courses, seeming to develop from sub-GCSE standard to graduation in a very short period. The quality of work produced at degree level is often very variable, with some of very high standard while others may have advanced little further than foundation level. Teaching at a federal university is a major goal of many graduates, with successful applicants acquiring security of tenure and in some cases a relatively light teaching load. Vacancies are few and extremely highly contested, therefore, with the minimum pre-requisite being a master's degree or even a doctorate, accompanied by a practical test, theory examination and demonstration lecture. Many lecturers at the Art Institute are former graduates of the institution and recognised artists in their own right. Directors of the Art Institute, together with heads-of-department positions, are chosen by election every four years by teaching staff, students and ancillary staff. Most such positions of extra responsibility are expected to be held during a teacher's career and offer little extra remuneration in return for a huge amount of extra work, administration and political manoeuvring for which many arts graduates and teachers are supremely unqualified.

Torreão was until recently a unique space in the Brazilian contemporary arts scene. Established in 1993 by two artists from Porto Alegre, Jailton Moreira and Elida Tessler. It soon became one of many informal spaces for art production, education and exhibition in Brazil. Two floors of a large house in the Bom Fim district of Porto Alegre initially provided studio space for the two artists and a space for teaching art to interested adults. The top floor, a 4m x 4m room with windows on all sides, became a space for artist interventions. Artists were invited from Brazil and Europe to produce a temporary intervention in the ‘tower' at the top of the building, and Jailton Moreira's courses in painting, sculpture and environmental intervention soon became an essential attraction for adults and students wishing to further or develop an interest in art. Entirely self-funding through student fees, occasional support from the Goethe institute, and the goodwill of the artists working in the tower, the organisation closed with expiry of the building lease in 2009, leaving a major gap in the Porto Alegre art circuit. Torreão was almost enigmatic in its existence. Visitors to the building would ring the bell, whereupon a key would be lowered on a string. There was no telephone or advertising, and despite extensive documentation of all projects being displayed at the annual ‘anniversary' exhibition, scarcely any records of its existence can be found on the Internet.

The Rio Grande do Sul Museum of Contemporary Art was founded in 1992 to research, preserve and disseminate contemporary art. It has a small base inside the state-run Casa de Cultura Mario Quintana, and a small collection of work by contemporary artists from Rio Grande do Sul and Brazil. Often starved of funding, and even a permanent base, the fortunes of the museum are directly affected by the political appointments of the state culture secretary, and state government arts policies. In recent years the museum has fallen into decline as a major institution in the state.

The Museum of Art of Rio Grande do Sul occupies an early 20th-century former customs building in Porto Alegre city centre and has an interesting collection of 3000 mainly two-dimensional works by local and national artists from the 19th century to the present and some works by international artists. Recently restored and fully equipped with appropriate museum services, it is now able to house touring exhibitions of an international standard. Exhibitions by local artists are also shown, but funding for these is non-existent and while artists have to apply to show their work in the museum, nearly all costs (including at times paint for the walls and the obligatory banner outside the building) have to be met by the artists themselves. Exhibitions of the collection are generally very well presented, while those of local artists are often of very mixed quality. Interpretation and guide services are provided by a team of volunteers. Admission is free to all exhibitions. Practical art classes are sometimes held in two workshop spaces on the roof of the building, and a bi-monthly art magazine used to be published with articles on and by local artists, critics and art historians. The magazine has not appeared for the past three years.

The Casa de Cultura Mario Quintana is a state-funded cultural centre in a converted hotel building, once the home of the revered local poet Mario Quintana. The building houses libraries, workshop spaces, theatres, small cinema spaces, photographic darkrooms for community use and three exhibition spaces. One space is occupied the Museum of Contemporary Art, another large white space on the same floor - the Galeria Xico Stockinger, named after a local sculptor - houses temporary exhibitions by local artists in the main, who have to fund all aspects of the exhibition except invitation print and mailing. Both spaces suffer regularly from huge variations in temperature and humidity, and it is not unknown for work to suffer rainwater infiltration or theft and exhibitions to be closed at random. A smaller space on the third floor also periodically houses exhibitions by local artists. The building's ascent or decline is again directly related to state government arts policies and funding, which tend to fluctuate widely.

The Usina do Gasômetro is a city-funded arts centre in a former power station. Its imposing space is occupied by exhibition spaces, theatres, cinema, workshop spaces and council arts offices. The visual arts spaces include the Galeria Iberê Camargo (named after the local painter) which houses temporary exhibitions by local artists and the Galeria dos Arcos and Galeria Lunardi, dedicated to photographic work. Other spaces in the building are periodically converted into temporary gallery spaces for special exhibitions or events such as regional and continental crafts fairs and biennials. The success or failure of these spaces is again directly related to city-government arts policies and funding and the public employees involved in their administration. Artists again generally have to fund most aspects of the exhibition, including at times the provision of security for the spaces and the works.

The Atelier Livre da Prefeitura has at times been one of the most important art teaching spaces in the city. Founded by Iberê Camargo and initially run by Xico Stockinger, two major figures on Rio Grande do Sul local arts scene in 1962 to "shake up the cultural stagnation of Rio Grande do Sul," it originally ran from a small space in the Municipal Market, acquiring its own premises in the Municipal Culture Centre in 1978. Funded by the city council, it offers courses in painting, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics and art theory, and has at times in its history rivalled the University Institute of Art in provision of teaching, to the extent that some students at the university would also attend classes at the Atelier Livre.

The city council also has its own art collections which are shown in two small rooms in the Museum of Art of Rio Grande do Sul, and two exhibition spaces in the former town hall in the city centre, the Paço Municipal, which also houses temporary exhibitions of contemporary art by local artists.

Santander Cultural is, as its name implies, a cultural institution operated by a multinational banking organisation. Opening in 2001, it occupies a neoclassical former bank in the city centre, housing cinema, music spaces and exhibition spaces and shows major Brazilian and international exhibitions, providing an important opening for contemporary international art in Rio Grande do Sul, which at times may appear swamped by the opulence of the lovingly preserved architectural features of the former bank. In contrast with state- and city-run institutions, there is little evidence of any lack of funding for provision of exhibitions here.

The Museu do Trabalho is an intriguing space that has been running for 25 years in Porto Alegre city centre, occupying wooden sheds which house a collection of antique machinery, printing presses and, more importantly, print workshops offering courses and services to artists for screenprinting, lithography, woodcut printing and etching, together with sculpture and modelling courses for the local community. Self-funding through a print-purchase membership club and prints donated by artists, it also has an exhibition space which, through the energy of its director and staff, exhibits some of the most interesting contemporary art from throughout Brazil, often by artists from outside the mainstream Brazilian art scene.

The Iberê Camargo Foundation is one of the most important cultural institutions in Rio Grande do Sul. Founded to commemorate the expressionist artist Iberê Camargo, who was born in the state and who spent his final years in Porto Alegre, the foundation now occupies the Golden Lion-award-winning Iberê Camargo Museum on the shore of Lake Guaíba on the outskirts of the city. Operating as a non-profit cultural organisation with business funding through cultural incentive legislation, the three-storey building holds rotating exhibitions from its extensive holdings of works by Iberê Camargo, related and complementary temporary exhibitions of modern and contemporary art, an extensive programme of school visits and workshops and provision of educational material, regular lecture and conference programmes on aspects of modern and contemporary art, and related publishing activities. The foundation also sponsors and runs an Invited Artist Programme for contemporary artists to produce a print using Iberê Camargo's print studio, re-housed in the building, and an annual bursary scheme for young artists to work for 3-month periods in overseas institutions. The Foundation's bilingual website also offers a virtual magazine with interviews with artists and curators and reports on exhibitions and art activity from around the world.

The Mercosul Visual Arts Biennial has been held in Porto Alegre since 1997, founded on the initiative of local artists and businesspeople. The event has grown in stature over the years to become one of the most important visual arts events in South America, concentrating on displaying art from the Mercosul region (Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, with associate members Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru) but also involving invited artists from around the world. It is held in public indoor and outdoor spaces throughout the city, and recently in other regions of Rio Grande do Sul, during the months of October and November, with parts of the exhibition often touring to other regions of Brazil and Mercosul. Funded by business sponsorship through cultural incentive legislation, the event also has a substantial education programme, running workshops, training teachers and mediators, providing educational material and free transport for state-school pupils to visit the exhibitions, and often includes a major publications programme. While not without the problems of many major biennial arts events, including funding, administration and the biennial cycle of re-inventing the wheel, it has become an essential event for people interested in finding out more about the art of South America, including historical exhibitions, modern and contemporary exhibitions, community projects and education programmes.

The Fundação Vera Chaves Barcellos was recently established by the Rio Grande do Sul artist Vera Chaves Barcellos as a continuation of her curatorial and theory practices, which have developed since the formation of groups like Nervo Óptico and Espaço NO in the 1970s and 1980s, and Obra Aberta in the 1990s. It now has its own gallery space in the grounds of the artist's home in Viamão, outside Porto Alegre, dedicated to showing works from her extensive personal collection of Brazilian and international contemporary art, and research and documentation of contemporary art in relation to her own work as an artist. The foundation is a privately funded, non-profit institution, supported through cultural incentive legislation.

Atelier Subterrânea is relatively new on the contemporary art scene in Rio Grande do Sul. Founded by a group of artists mainly connected to the University Arts Institute, the studio operates from the basement of a building in central Porto Alegre, which is both the studio for the artists involved and an exhibition space for shows curated by the artists themselves. Exhibitions are generally funded by the raffle of a work by a participating artist. Atelier Subterrânea has won several Açorianos Awards from the city council, and has recently been awarded a major grant by the national Funarte arts fund.

The following links relate to short articles on aspects of contemporary art in Rio Grande do Sul published in the Iberê Camargo Foundation digital magazine relating to Artists Groups, Subterrânea and Torreão

Image: Interior, Rio Grande do Sul Museum of Art, with Pedro Weingartner exhibition, photo by Nick Rands

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