Special Dossier: DEATH – Imagery
Aiming a better understanding of my work, as well as of any creative one, it is necessary to make a trip back in time, to the time of our childhood and youth to search the set of images, books that have been read, films that have been seen, music, events, people, whatever, everything which in a special way has printed our soul and built what we are today, both as an artist and as person.
Yes, it is true that in my childhood, I speak of my earlier infancy; the fairy tales already shocked me, either for its cruelty or for its morals, but at the same time they enchanted me and carried me to a magical world like Alice (1) It was a world of my own.
Cats and rabbits
Would reside in fancy little houses
And be dressed in shoes
And hats and trousers
In a world of my own
All the flowers
Would have very Extra special powers
They would sit And talk to me for hours
When I'm lonely
In a world of my own
There'd be new birds
Lots of nice and friendly
How-do'ya do birds
Everyone would have
A dozen blue birds
Within that world of my own
I could listen to a babbling brook
And hear a song that
I could understand
I keep wishing it could be that way
Because my world would be a wonderland
Perraut (2), Esopo (3), La Fontaine (4), Grimm Brothers (5), Monteiro Lobato (6) Camões (7). Also relevant is the fact that all the Brazilian storybook and bestiary is packed with fantastic legends, characters (8) and stories (9). The books, the encyclopedias (10), the innumerable magazines (11), the comics (12). To complete these sources of curiosity and this gluttony, which I’ve always had regarding images. I am a man who believes that an image is worth a thousand words.
Quite early I had contact with the DEATH, not with the real Death but with what I call the Plastic Death (or fake Death)(13). This Plastic Death was constant in this period of my life. It was always lived in a romantic and sentimental perspective and it was never connected with loss or real grief, but it was nevertheless overwhelming because it gave and represented this loss in an exaggerated and symbolic way.
As if I had lost something, which I never really had had, in reality. Later, as a teenager, this sensation of loss was replaced with the idea of it as the pleasure source of all my artistic creation (14).
Thus, better that to extend me in this narrative, and bolding the power of the images, I invite you to visit this Special Dossier.
(1) ALICE IN WONDERLAND by Lewis Carroll, I only read the original story after the age of 20, until then the version known was the one of Walt Disney
(2) BLUE BEARD was told by my grandmother Virginia
(3) The Oak and the Rush (book)
(4) The Man who didn’t fear the Death
(5) I was 5 years old and I already acted as the Bad Wolf in the “Little Red Riding Hood” in my first theatre piece, later I was the (Hansel) in the “Hansel and Gretel” (João e Maria, in Portuguese) story, but I confess that I did not enjoy it too much, I preferred the role of the wolf.
(6) O Sítio do Pica Pau Amarelo,
(7) Inês de Castro the Dead Queen were told by my mother
(8) Mãe d’Água, Saci Pererê, Curupira, Negrinho do Pastoreio, Cuca, Mula sem Cabeça, Iara among other haunted stories were told by my grandfather Manuel
(9) Ensor and the Pre-Raphaelites paintings always shocked and fascinated me.
(10) I’d go nuts with the illustrations of the Divine Comedy by Dante made by Gustave Doré.
(11) Manchete and O Cruzeiro
(12) It was as we called Comics in Brazil
(13) This is what I call death seen on TV or in the Cinema
(14) BANDOLERO by Andrew V. McLaglen the loss if transformed into object of pleasure.
Perraut (2), Esopo (3), La Fontaine (4), Grimm Brothers (5), Monteiro Lobato (6) Camões (7). Also relevant is the fact that all the Brazilian storybook and bestiary is packed with fantastic legends, characters (8) and stories (9). The books, the encyclopedias (10), the innumerable magazines (11), the comics (12). To complete these sources of curiosity and this gluttony, which I’ve always had regarding images. I am a man who believes that an image is worth a thousand words.
Quite early I had contact with the DEATH, not with the real Death but with what I call the Plastic Death (or fake Death)(13). This Plastic Death was constant in this period of my life. It was always lived in a romantic and sentimental perspective and it was never connected with loss or real grief, but it was nevertheless overwhelming because it gave and represented this loss in an exaggerated and symbolic way.
As if I had lost something, which I never really had had, in reality. Later, as a teenager, this sensation of loss was replaced with the idea of it as the pleasure source of all my artistic creation (14).
Thus, better that to extend me in this narrative, and bolding the power of the images, I invite you to visit this Special Dossier.
(1) ALICE IN WONDERLAND by Lewis Carroll, I only read the original story after the age of 20, until then the version known was the one of Walt Disney
(2) BLUE BEARD was told by my grandmother Virginia
(3) The Oak and the Rush (book)
(4) The Man who didn’t fear the Death
(5) I was 5 years old and I already acted as the Bad Wolf in the “Little Red Riding Hood” in my first theatre piece, later I was the (Hansel) in the “Hansel and Gretel” (João e Maria, in Portuguese) story, but I confess that I did not enjoy it too much, I preferred the role of the wolf.
(6) O Sítio do Pica Pau Amarelo,
(7) Inês de Castro the Dead Queen were told by my mother
(8) Mãe d’Água, Saci Pererê, Curupira, Negrinho do Pastoreio, Cuca, Mula sem Cabeça, Iara among other haunted stories were told by my grandfather Manuel
(9) Ensor and the Pre-Raphaelites paintings always shocked and fascinated me.
(10) I’d go nuts with the illustrations of the Divine Comedy by Dante made by Gustave Doré.
(11) Manchete and O Cruzeiro
(12) It was as we called Comics in Brazil
(13) This is what I call death seen on TV or in the Cinema
(14) BANDOLERO by Andrew V. McLaglen the loss if transformed into object of pleasure.
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