Waltercio Caldas
March 6 – April 24, 2010
916 Colorado Avenue
Santa Monica, CA 90401 USA
The Christopher Grimes Gallery is pleased to exhibit new work by Brazilian artist, Waltercio Caldas, from March 6th till April 24th, 2010.
Since his last solo exhibition at the Christopher Grimes Gallery in 2005, Caldas has had solo exhibitions at premier international institutions, including the Centro Galego de Arte Contemporanea, Spain, and the Fundacao Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, Portugal. In 2007, he was included in Robert Storr’s exhibition, ‘Think with the Senses – Feel with the Mind. Art in the Present Tense’ during the 52nd Venice Biennale.
Caldas is widely considered to be one of the most important Brazilian artists working today. Inspired by geometric abstraction and working in a diverse array of materials – each situation determining the media – Caldas’ work articulates the tenuous relationship between the architectural space and those who occupy it. From a distance, one sees an abstract pattern of lines intersecting areas of color. However, upon closer inspection, one discovers that the lines are not as rigid as they first appeared – swaying slightly with the air current in the room. These materials allow him to sculpt the surrounding negative space. In the words of one critic: “The work insists persistently upon being a border. It further insists upon reducing the border it is. It wants to erase its outlines, its very constitution.”
In a similar fashion, the artists’ drawings and stainless steel wall constructions explore ideas of experience and perception within a formal dialogue by using thread to lead the eye from one point to another. They allude to perspective space that is not wholly present creating, what Caldas says is “a maximum presence from the least amount of material.”
Waltercio Caldas lives and works in Rio de Janeiro and has shown extensively internationally since the 1960′s. He has had solo exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art, Rio de Janeiro, Museum of Art, São Paulo, and Centre D’Art Contemporain, Geneva, among many others, and also represented Brazil in the 47th Venice Biennale and Documenta IX. Forthcoming solo exhibitions include the Blanton Art Museum, Texas and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia.
His work is included in numerous permanent collections; some of which include the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Staaliche Museen, Kassel, the Chase Manhattan Collection and the Museum of Modern Art, São Paulo.
For biographical information and a selection of additional images please visit our website at http://www.cgrimes.com or contact Christopher Grimes Gallery, 310-587-3373.
Christopher Grimes Gallery
916 Colorado Avenue
Santa Monica, CA 90401 USA
Tuesday – Saturday 10 – 5:30
Image above:
Waltercio Caldas
Dinamo (detail) and Shade, Installation View, 2010