Vanderlei Lopes: Arena

Galeria Athena is pleased to present Arena, by Vanderlei Lopes.

Created this year, the works that make up this exhibition are correlated by the temporality of events in the current world, where facts and fiction interact. They are made from the molds of original objects, which bring them close to reality, that is, the known object. At first glance, the nature of such materials – bronze – is not revealed. Many of the pieces involve the issue of movement, as if time had been frozen during an action. Thus, transitory and everyday situations appear as sculptures that wish to discuss such phenomena.

A large cut tree trunk with an empty arena on top of it, cast in bronze, occupies the smaller room of the gallery. The arena was built inspired by the concentric tree growth rings, which can be seen in a cutout. The growth rings in the wood, symbolized here by the bleachers, allow one to scientifically calculate the age of a tree. Since time immemorial, the arena is, by definition, and amphitheater for events and performances, which is shown empty in this work. In its tiered design, concentric movements overlaps the growth rings of the tree and to the cultural time to which the arena makes reference. The work relates the cut in the wood to the civilizational event, where the empty amphitheater makes a reference to the social state where events unfold.

The bigger room houses Insomnia, comprising a photograph of a tornado and a pillow cast in bronze with a whirlwind on its surface. The form of the pillow on the floor, complements the action of the phenomenon shown in the photo that is handing above it.

Scattered on the floor are newspapers, bronze sculptures depicting transformation – such as explosions, objects or everyday situations that caught fire, such as the ones that hit the National Museum and the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro and the Museum of the Portuguese Language, in São Paulo. The images oppose to phrases of di erent – either appropriated or transformed – origins, manifests and fragments of reflections written by emblematic personalities that are part of a cultural elite. Some sort of tragedy that permeates the newspapers scattered on the floor tries to oppose a constructive repertoire to another, more tragic one.

In the same room is the work Demiurge – a blue bronze bag floating in the air close to the wall, as the residue of a wind that passed by and crystallized the flight of that object in a suspension state. By definition, Demiurge is the artisan-like figure responsible for maintaining the universe, who here seems to unveil, along with the tornado, the events projected on the chaotic matter presented in the work.

Vanderlei Lopes creates a game of contrasts where the smaller physical space is occupied by a single, large-size piece, whereas the larger space, occupied by other smaller-size works, shows a sparser aspect; this creates an inversion, just like the empty arena, which contrasts with its original, eventful purpose. The exhibition is named after this broader perspective on what an arena would be – a place of events where a tree had just been cut, newspapers tell recent news, as well as a place where a blue bag and a pillow are left after a tornado.