Women sculptors and Biennials: the construction of artistic recognition in the post-war period

Author(s)

Marina Mazze Cerchiaro

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Escola de Comunicações e Artes (ECA/SBD)
• Defense date: 2020-10-29

Examining board members

Ana Paula Cavalcanti Simioni; Maria de Fátima Morethy Couto; Maria Amelia Bulhoes Garcia; Ana Gonçalves Magalhães; Isabel Plante; Heloisa André Pontes

• Advisor: Ana Paula Cavalcanti Simioni

Abstract

Since the 1970s the history of feminist art has shown that women participated in various ways of artistic production system. Many studies have tried to analyze the obstacles faced by women artists in their career building efforts, and the obfuscation of their trajectories and the absence of their names in the canon. However, there are few studies regarding the recognition of the women artists. The main objective of this research is to reflect on how women sculptors, particularly those working in Brazil in the 1950s and 1960s, built their name, focusing in how gender dynamics affect the construction of the artistic recognition process. This thesis is structured on three scales. In the first, more comprehensive, we seek to analyze in a comparative and quantitative way the awards of the Biennials of São Paulo and Paris in the period from 1951 to 1967, emphasizing the dimensions of nationality and gender of the women artists awarded. In the second, the trajectories of the sculptors awarded in the two Biennials are investigated, seeking to understand the role of the prizes in the projection of the career of these artists and in the consolidation of their recognition. In the third, the microscale, the focus is directed to the trajectories of Maria Martins, Mary Vieira and Lygia Clark - Brazilian sculptors awarded in the Biennials of São Paulo that had greater recognition and international circulation. We analyze the beginning of their careers, some of their works, the various strategies adopted for the construction of recognition, with special attention to the exhibitions, the critical reception, the international circulation, the contact networks and the construction of their identities as artists. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 16/21513-4 - Women Sculptors and Biennials: the construction of artistic recognition in the post-war period
• Grantee: Marina Mazze Cerchiaro
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate