Gestural Abstraction

O

Oswaldo Costa

Oswaldo Costa
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Tonight is a big night. Before several hundred members of the local art world, I am opening a not-for-profit contemporary art center, something Ive wanted to do for twenty something years.

Ive been collecting contemporary art (on a shoestring) since I was a teenager, but constant moving meant sending most things into storage. One of the reasons I moved back to Brazil after life in a suit & tie was to bring together the collection, containing some 500-odd paintings, sculptures, photographs, drawings and prints, and organize exhibitions about its different aspects.

Eighteen months were spent looking for the right space and another eighteen months renovating it. Its finally ready, and Im happy with the results. In the 1,150 sq ft basement there is plenty of storage; in the 1,150 sq ft ground floor there is a striking, high ceilinged exhibition demi-cube where my first effort, a show of monochromes by seventeen Brazilian artists, was just installed. The show is minimal and spare. The next will be all photographs, flashy and cacophonous. I dont want a house style or identity, just a constant dedication to the proposition that all tastes are created equal and that cultural politics make some dominant and not others.

Id like to invite everyone here to the opening. Its an abstract gesture without plane tickets and hotel rooms, but Id like to invite everyone here. Come.
 
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
Fantastic! I'm on a plane.

Morally speaking.

What will you pour, I wonder, at the opening?
Click to expand...

I was afraid you'd ask. I tried the three Alentejo reds locally available in 5L bag-in-box and chose the one I liked best. It wasn't bad at all, with some generosity.

I considered serving Jobard, but the renovation has decimated my savings.
 
Congrats Oswaldo! That's a great dream to finally realize. I too am on an airplane (figuratively) jetting in for the opening. Looking forward to the pictures.

originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
the three Alentejo reds locally available in 5L bag-in-box and chose the one I liked best. It wasn't bad at all, with some generosity.
Click to expand...
I doubt the young artists who'll mostly likely show up will mind the box wine at all.
 
Wow, Oswaldo, well done! Would that I could be there for your opening, but I wish you a virtual broken leg in absentia. Perhaps we can take up a collection to send Putnam there for a photoessay? He might even be able to smuggle in some Puzelat for those in the know.

Mark Lipton
 
Cool, Oswaldo.

Is that guy's name Milton Machado or Million Machado? I can't tell on this monitor. Million Machado. It has a certain ring to it.
 
Good luck, Oswaldo! I hope the show goes well indeed.

(I am imagining a thick-thewed wrestler named "Million 'Macho' Machado" who carries on a secret life as a romorantin-sipping abstract expressionist black and white photographer.)
 
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