Rosângela Rennó: photography, displacement and disappearance in Brazilian contemporary art

• Grant number: 11/14793-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: May 01, 2012
• End date: January 31, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Arts - Art Fundamentals and Criticism
• Principal Investigator: Maria de Fátima Morethy Couto
• Grantee: Talita Mendes
• Host Institution: Instituto de Artes (IA). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This research project intends to analyze three installations made by the Brazilian artist Rosângela Rennó - Imemorial (1994), In Oblivionem (1994-1995) and Hipocampo (1995) - aiming to understand the artist's investigations about the photographic image and the implication of its uses when related to memory, displacement and aesthetics of disappearance concepts in contemporary art. Besides the mentioned works, the artist's working progress Arquivo Universal (since 1992) will be also considered in the analysis, once it consists in her personal collection of news articles which are usually consulted during the conception of her works. It will be fundamental for this research the analysis of Rennó's position as a collector of ruins (wasted photos and other cultural remains) to problematize the tension between the two types of collection, which mean different ways to deal with time and history: there is the unique and affectionate dimension of the artist's collection as a memory practice - fragmentary par excellence - and the organization of her installations in spaces for art expositions (galleries and museums), where the historical linear discourse is predominant. The role of the artist, which will be discussed during this research, coincides with the positive countertype of the collector, defined by Walter Benjamin as the one who discards the utility functions of the objects, connecting the action of collecting to a nonlinear dialectical perception of time. The artist's position will be related to the disappearance concept thought by the philosopher Paul Virilio, important for the analysis of the alterations Rosângela Rennó does in the images she appropriates. (AU)

Academic Publications

(References retrieved automatically from State of São Paulo Research Institutions)

MENDES, Talita. Rosângela Rennó: photography, displacements and disappearance in brazilian contemporary art. 2014. Master's Dissertation - Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Instituto de Artes Campinas, SP.