The first major UK public gallery survey of the pioneering and influential Brazilian artist, Lygia Clark.
The exhibition focuses on Clark’s artistic journey from the mid-1950s to early 1970s, a particularly volatile period in Brazil’s history when radical modes of artistic practice also emerged. Clark was a central figure in the Brazilian Neo-concrete movement (1959 – 1961) alongside fellow artists, Amilcar de Castro, Ferreira Gullar, Hélio Oiticica and Lygia Pape (amongst others), who were frustrated by what they felt were the limitations of ‘concrete art’ and its emphasis on non-figurative geometric abstraction. Neo-concrete artists, instead, began to push for greater experimentation, expression, colour and poetic sensibility in their practices – as well as proposing a shift in how audiences might participate in artworks.
The I and the You reveals how Clark’s early formal experimentation and growing interest in the philosophy of experience and therapeutic potential of art led to a gradual closure of the gap between the work and the viewer.
The exhibition opens with a series of paintings, studies and works on paper. These show how her investigations into painting’s constitutive elements resulted in an increasingly intuitive approach towards composition. At this time, she also became engaged in finding new ways for audiences to physically interact with her artworks continuing her interest in the relationship between object and viewer, internal and external, self and world.
The exhibition also features examples of Clark’s Bichos (beasts or ‘critters’) – groundbreaking works born out of her enquiries into two dimensional surfaces or planes, designed to be manipulated by the viewer making them an active participant in an ever-changing sculptural form.
The last part of The I and the You presents some of Clark’s participatory group work. Having fled the increasingly repressive political environment in Brazil, her work in France fuelled by the revolutionary spirit of the time and place, sought to bridge the very boundaries of art by exploring group dynamics. These works will be activated through a series of performances taking place every Saturday throughout the exhibition run.
Lygia Clark: The I and the You: 2 October 2024 – 12 January 2025
Admission: £12.50 (Standard ticket); £9.50 (Concessions)
Opening times: Tuesday – Sunday, 11am – 6pm; Thursdays, 11am – 9pm
Whitechapel Gallery, 77 – 82 Whitechapel High Street, London E1 7QX
Further Information: Lygia Clark: The I and the You - Whitechapel Gallery