Latin America gets taste of France`s art

Latin America is getting its first taste of ‘art brut’ by Jean Dubuffet.

Sao Paulo: Latin America is getting its first taste of ‘art brut’ by France`s Jean Dubuffet, the pioneer of the school of primitive representations that rebel against structured convention.The Tomi Ohtake Institute in Sao Paulo is hosting 84 works of the Dubuffet Foundation in Paris as part of a cultural program celebrating the Year of France in Brazil.

The collection reflects the experimentation and groundbreaking approach championed by Dubuffet (1901-1985), a former wine-seller whose art career really only began in his 40s. The works are "a preview of what later became contemporary art," said Ricardo Ohtake, the director of the institute. The French artist`s initial abstract paintings of nudes are composed of different textures laid down in bold colors: reds, blacks, blues and white. Later stages saw him incorporate collages and finally a free-form style eschewing rules that confirmed the "raw art" label he applied himself to his oeuvre. Presented chronologically, the exhibition traces Dubuffet`s development of a school in which artistic constraints are dismissed in favor of "works made by people free of artistic culture" in his quest for re-inventing painting. The deliberately counterculture style -- inspired in part from art made in insane asylums -- adopts varied materials, including lithographs and oil paint, acrylic on paper fixed to canvas and even epoxy paint on polyurethane . Dubuffet`s leanings into sculpture took on an architectural edge, as evidenced by the key element of the exhibition: his animal-themed "Coucou Bazar" (1971), depicting a performance in which different actors and dancers enter and leave the work. Only nine of the 200 pieces making up "Coucou Bazar," an animated painting from Dubuffet`s "L`Hourloupe" cycle, are on display in Brazil. But even that is rare enough. The work has traveled only three other times in its history: in 1973, to New York`s Guggenheim Museum and the Grand Palais in Paris; and in 1978, to Italy`s Palazzo della Promotrice delle Belle Arti in Turin. "It`s the first time Dubuffet has come to Latin America, which is very important. It`s a retrospective that shows very well the development of his work," said Dubuffet Foundation president Francois Gibault. Bureau Report