The Month of the Children and the Insane: reconstitution of the 1933 paulista exibition

Author(s)

Raquel Carneiro Amin

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Instituto de Artes
• Defense date: 2009-08-21

Examining board members

Lucia Helena Reily; Maria Heloisa Correa de Toledo Ferraz; João Francisco Duarte Junior

• Advisor: Lucia Helena Reily

Abstract

The "Month of the Children and the Insane": reconstitution of the 1933 Paulista Exhibition From the nineteenth-century to the present day, there has been growing interest on the part of psychiatrists, psychologists and visual artists in bringing together the artistic production by the insane and by children. In Brazil, such interest emerges in the 1920s with publications by the psychiatrist Osório Cesar who studied visual arts productions of psychiatric patients from Hospital Juqueri, as well as Ulisses Pernambucano who founded the Instituto de Psicologia in Recife in 1925. This study aimed to investigate the "Month of the Children and the Insane" - an exhibition and series of conferences organized in 1933 by the artist Flávio de Carvalho and Osório Cesar in São Paulo at the Clube dos Artistas Modernos (CAM) - with the participation of artists, medical doctors, intellectuals and education professionals, at a time of great modernist upheaval in the country. The event illuminated common aspects of productions by children and people with mental illness. The discussion mainly circled around the emerging interest among some visual artists and psychiatrists in artwork by children on the one hand and by the insane on the other, which this event brought together under the same roof. This study used documentary methodology to design the structure of the event (how the month was organized, which collections and works were shown, and how they were presented, and who participated) and its cultural impact, We were interested in understanding the arguments that justified the event, the guiding principles, the curatorial design, the repercussions in current newspapers and in journals that were involved and related to the exhibition. The study showed that this event represented a breakthrough in terms of the coming together of the fields of visual arts, education and psychology, with significant cultural results for the city of São Paulo in the 1930s. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 07/06880-1 - Visual artists and the "Month of children and madman": reconstitution of the 1933 São Paulo exhibit
• Grantee: Raquel Carneiro Amin
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master