Between the street and the museum

The National Museum of Afro-Brazilian Culture (MUNCAB) inaugurates the exhibition “Memory: accounts of another history”, one of the central events of France-Brazil 2025 Season.

Curated by Nadine Hounkpatin e Jamile Coelhothe exhibition brings together 20 black female artists From the African diaspora and the African continent, who appropriate the visual arts as a field for elaborating memory and symbolically reconstructing the world. Their productions establish a decolonial thought, in which art acts as a form of listening, rewriting, and re-existence.

Participants: Amélia Sampaio, Barbara Asei Dantoni, Barbara Portailler, Beya Gille Gacha, Charlotte Yonga, Dalila Dalléas Bouzar, Enam Gbewonyo, Fabiana Ex-Souza, Gosette Lubondo, Josèfa Ntjam, Luana Vitra, Luisa Magaly, Luma Nascimento, Madalena dos Santos Reinbolt, Maria Lídia dos Santos Magliani, Myriam Mihindou, Na Chainkua Reindorf, Selly Raby Kane, Tuli Mekondjo and YêdaMaria.

After touring Bordeaux, Abidjan, Yaoundé, and Antananarivo, the exhibition arrives in Salvador—a city where African heritage manifests itself as an aesthetic and artistic foundation—to establish a new chapter in the project. At MUNCAB, these artists construct a territory of enunciation and reparation, in which image, body, and gesture become instruments for reconfiguring historical narratives and affirming Black subjectivities.

The exhibition is a project of the Ministry of Culture, Petrobras, and the French Embassy in Brazil, in partnership with MUNCAB, and managed by Amafro.

Service
Exhibition Memory: accounts of another history
November 04th to March 1st, 2026
Tuesday to Sunday, from 10:00 AM to 4:30 PM, Saturday from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM

The Pinacoteca's last exhibition of 2025, “Carnival Work”, is a collective exhibition with works by 70 artists from different generations and backgrounds, such as Alberto Pitta, Bajado, Barbara Wagner, Ilu Obá de Min, Heitor dos Prazeres, Juarez Paraíso, Lita Cerqueira, Maria Apparecida Urbano, Rafa Bqueer and Rosa Magalhães.

The exhibition at the Pina Contemporânea building displays 200 works including props, decoration projects and historical documentation in photography and video, as well as commissions for new projects by the artists. adonai, Ana Lira e Ray Vianna.

Divided into four themes – Fantasy fabric, Jobs, The ability to  e City, “Carnival Work” presents the country's largest popular festival as a production chain that involves the work of many hands even before the festival takes place, while alluding to the precariousness and invisibility of these professionals.

THEMATIC CENTERS

The core Fantasy fabric refers to two characteristic elements of Carnival: the act of dressing up and the power of imagination. Projects and sketches are part of the central part of the Grand Gallery, such as studies of J. Cunha for the Salvador carnival and Joana Lira for the street decorations in Recife.

Discussions about the party's working conditions are presented in the core Jobs, in which works are presented that bring to light the representation of workers.

The relationship between carnival and urban or rural space appears in the core City through representations of blocks, cordons, afoxés and other forms of processions. The center brings together works such as photographs taken by Diego Nigro in the Galo da Madrugada carnival block (2025).

Finally, the core The ability to  celebrates the meetings of sugarcane workers in Pernambuco transforming themselves into kings and queens of maracatu, as well as black women and marginalized peripheral groups becoming, for a few days, the figures of command during the festival in Bahia: Ebony Goddesses, Reis Momos, Carnival Queens.

Service
Exhibition Carnival Work
From November 8, 2025 to April 12, 2026
Wednesday to Monday, from 10:18 to XNUMX:XNUMX

A DM Mendes Wood We are pleased to present the exhibition. Birth & Standardization de Antonio Oba, which occupies the entire gallery space in Barra Funda with new and emblematic works. The works, developed using distinct techniques such as painting, drawing, installation, and film, continue the artist's investigation into the construction of national identity, and its contradictions and influences, through icons and symbols present in Brazilian culture.

The exhibition's title stems from the idea of ​​birth as a marker of a moment, of a new existence on Earth. This miraculous event also carries the counterpart of fortune and luck, which accompanies us from conception. For Obá, “Being subject to this is not about a choice. Being subject to this is about an irreverence towards the inevitable. So, what we can do is demarcate these various fortunes through rite, celebration, symbol, and language.”

Each work that makes up the exhibition contributes to this attempt to situate the idea of ​​luck, fortune, sometimes as a prayer, sometimes as a ritual that celebrates it.

An unprecedented installation, located in an enclosed space at the back of the gallery, directly refers to the idea of ​​play and luck. In it, columns of cowrie shells spill over gilded bronze sieves, carrying ceramic eggs painted red. The cowrie shells represent elements of an attempt to read luck, destiny, and fate, and symbolize the currency of exchange, which also transforms into an offering. In their arrangement within the space, the cowrie shells form ascending columns, like a territory of spiritual elevation and re-signification of life in the face of its potentially fatalistic aspects.

At the entrance to the exhibition space, a path of swords representing Saint George and Iansã leads to a new installation: an altar with two tree trunks symbolizing the pillory. The trunks are entirely studded with nails—in one, the nails point outwards; in the other, inwards—symbolizing protection and punishment and the difficulty of harmonizing tensions. Between the pillories, cables suspend a bronze head with a plumb bob at the tip. This installation is an offering to the lord of the path, therefore, it has a connection with Exu.

the installation Ka'a porá (2024), presented for the first time in the traveling exhibition Finca-Pé: Stories of the Land At the CCBB in Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte, and Brasília, it occupies a prominent place in the exhibition. Sculptures of feet, representing both the human foot and that of a tree, emphasize the connection with the ground. The configuration of the work resembles a small garden, with trunks arranged in a seemingly random way, each suggesting a different direction within a labyrinth. The title of the installation derives from the Tupi term. ka'a porá, which refers to an individual who settles and anchors themselves to the land. The expression also alludes to the mythical figure of Caipora, protector of the forests in Brazilian indigenous mythology. Another symbolic element of the installation revisits the concept of pruning, understood here as an act of violence that breaks with life and nature.

Paintings of varying sizes and techniques compose the visual narrative of the exhibition. A set of 22 small-format paintings presents Obá's interpretation of the Tarot. In these works, the artist uses a mixture of techniques along with gold leaf, giving a unique magical and fantastical tone to the oracle cards. In addition to these, the exhibition includes new large-scale paintings, as well as a work painted directly onto one of the walls of the exhibition space. In these pieces, figures and symbols that make up Brazilian identity suggest new interpretations. The exhibition also includes previously unseen drawings made with charcoal, India ink, pencil, and tempera on canvas.

The film Charmed (2024) presents a performance by the artist that proposes reflections on symbolic systems — especially religious ones. The performative action evokes a ritualistic perspective, centered on the figure of the pilgrim, who, in his gesture, synthesizes elements of belief, culture and tradition associated with the imagery of the pilgrim.

With this collection of works, which spans different media and symbolisms, the exhibition reaffirms the power of Antonio Obá's production in constructing a poetics that investigates identity, territory, and spirituality.

Service
Exhibition Birth
From November 8th March 14, 2026
Tuesday to Friday, from 11 am to 19 pm, Saturday from 10 am to 17 pm

A DAN Gallery presents the exhibition Brazil during the Modernist period, curated by Maria Alice MillietGathering around 50 works emblematic of fundamental names such as Tarsila do Amaral, Di Cavalcanti, Cícero Dias, Victor Brecheret, Cândido Portinari, Guignard, Alfredo Volpi, Anita Malfatti Among others, the collective exhibition traces an overview of modern art in the country and highlights the role of the movement that, starting in the 1920s, redefined the national artistic language and added updated visions of the Brazilian popular imagination to the collective imagination.

The Brazil of the Modernists takes as its starting point the transformations that marked the emergence of artistic modernity in Brazil, a movement that consolidated itself in the confrontation between cultural conservatism and the impulse for renewal of a country in transition. The Modern Art Week of 1922 is revisited here as a symbolic landmark of this clash: booed by the public, it exposed the resistance to new languages ​​and the rupture with traditional standards, inaugurating a production focused on aesthetic updating and the construction of a Brazilian artistic identity.

The curatorial journey portrays how the first modernists, in search of training and recognition, turned to the great artistic centers of Europe. It was from this experience that many began to perceive the strength and originality of Brazilian cultural diversity in the construction of their own artistic identities. “Our modernists didn't need to seek in exotic places the popular or ethnic content that so enchanted Europeans. They found in our landscapes and customs the ingredients for the constitution of a visuality of national character,” affirms curator Maria Alice Milliet.

Although influenced by European avant-garde movements, modern art in Brazil remained faithful to figuration. Contact with the "return to order" movement in the interwar period led artists to explore expressionist, cubist, and later surrealist languages, in a process that defined the aesthetic foundations of early Brazilian modernism.

Among the highlights of the exhibition is the Portrait of Judite (1944), by Alfredo Volpi. Painted in the year the artist married Benedita da Conceição, known as Judite, the work depicts his wife nude between curtains, with open arms, as if presenting the paintings that surround her. Volpi, who began his career decorating São Paulo facades, developed his own language, marked by geometrization and the refined use of color. His work symbolizes the transition from figurative painting to a mature, enlightened modernity with a strong Brazilian identity.

“It is undeniable that Tarsila, Di Cavalcanti, Cícero Dias, Rego Monteiro, Brecheret, Portinari, and Guignard constituted an iconographic corpus identified with Brazil. More than that, modernism added to the national imagination updated visions of our sociocultural reality. In other words, when we think of Brazilian women, the sensuality of the dark-haired women painted by Di Cavalcanti comes to mind; the history of the conquest of our territory is realized in Brecheret's Monument to the Bandeiras; our myths are those of Tarsila; our beaches are those of Pancetti; and popular festivals find their best expression in the colorful little flags of Volpi,” adds Maria Alice Milliet regarding the exhibition's theme.

By bringing together fundamental works from the period, the exhibition "Brazil of the Modernists" highlights the historical and cultural relevance of the movement that redefined the course of art in the country. The group show reinforces the role of this generation of artists in building a visual identity and reaffirms the continued relevance of their legacy in shaping what is understood as Brazilianness.

Artists present

Alberto da Veiga Guignard, Alfredo Volpi, Anita Malfatti, Candido Portinari, Cícero Dias, Emiliano Di Cavalcanti, Ernesto De Fiori, Ismael Nery, José Pancetti, Tarsila do Amaral, Vicente do Rego Monteiro, and Victor Brecheret.

Service
Exhibition Brazil during the Modernist period
From November 19th to January 19th
Monday to Friday, from 10 am to 19 pm, Saturdays from 10 am to 13 pm.

A central figure in the history of cinema, with films that have marked generations. Agnès Varda (1928–2019) is also the author of an extensive photographic production, having even begun her career as a photographer. Over the years, she established herself as a filmmaker, but photography remained present in her trajectory, whether in her films or in the artistic installations she produced in the 21st century. This facet of her work, still less known to the public, is presented in the exhibition Photography AGNÈS VARDA Cinema, which opens on IMS Paulista, with free entry.

The exposure Photography AGNÈS VARDA Cinema The exhibition brings together approximately 200 photographs taken by Varda, primarily between the 1950s and 1960s. The collection includes images captured during her travels, including previously unseen photographs from China in 1957, photos from Cuba in the post-revolutionary context, and from the USA, where the artist documented the Black Panthers. There are also photos taken in Paris, such as those of a play staged by the Griots, the city's first Black theatre company. In dialogue with these photographs, the exhibition presents excerpts from the artist's films, emphasizing how social commitment, an affectionate gaze, and humor characterize her work.

Service
Exhibition | Photography AGNÈS VARDA Cinema
From November 29th to April 12th, 2026
Tuesday to Sunday and holidays from 10am to 20pm (closed on Mondays)

The National Museum of Afro-Brazilian Culture (MUNCAB) inaugurates the exhibition “Memory: accounts of another history”, one of the central events of France-Brazil 2025 Season.

Curated by Nadine Hounkpatin e Jamile Coelhothe exhibition brings together 20 black female artists From the African diaspora and the African continent, who appropriate the visual arts as a field for elaborating memory and symbolically reconstructing the world. Their productions establish a decolonial thought, in which art acts as a form of listening, rewriting, and re-existence.

Participants: Amélia Sampaio, Barbara Asei Dantoni, Barbara Portailler, Beya Gille Gacha, Charlotte Yonga, Dalila Dalléas Bouzar, Enam Gbewonyo, Fabiana Ex-Souza, Gosette Lubondo, Josèfa Ntjam, Luana Vitra, Luisa Magaly, Luma Nascimento, Madalena dos Santos Reinbolt, Maria Lídia dos Santos Magliani, Myriam Mihindou, Na Chainkua Reindorf, Selly Raby Kane, Tuli Mekondjo and YêdaMaria.

After touring Bordeaux, Abidjan, Yaoundé, and Antananarivo, the exhibition arrives in Salvador—a city where African heritage manifests itself as an aesthetic and artistic foundation—to establish a new chapter in the project. At MUNCAB, these artists construct a territory of enunciation and reparation, in which image, body, and gesture become instruments for reconfiguring historical narratives and affirming Black subjectivities.

The exhibition is a project of the Ministry of Culture, Petrobras, and the French Embassy in Brazil, in partnership with MUNCAB, and managed by Amafro.

Service
Exhibition Memory: accounts of another history
November 04th to March 1st, 2026
Tuesday to Sunday, from 10:00 AM to 4:30 PM, Saturday from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM

The Pinacoteca's last exhibition of 2025, “Carnival Work”, is a collective exhibition with works by 70 artists from different generations and backgrounds, such as Alberto Pitta, Bajado, Barbara Wagner, Ilu Obá de Min, Heitor dos Prazeres, Juarez Paraíso, Lita Cerqueira, Maria Apparecida Urbano, Rafa Bqueer and Rosa Magalhães.

The exhibition at the Pina Contemporânea building displays 200 works including props, decoration projects and historical documentation in photography and video, as well as commissions for new projects by the artists. adonai, Ana Lira e Ray Vianna.

Divided into four themes – Fantasy fabric, Jobs, The ability to  e City, “Carnival Work” presents the country's largest popular festival as a production chain that involves the work of many hands even before the festival takes place, while alluding to the precariousness and invisibility of these professionals.

THEMATIC CENTERS

The core Fantasy fabric refers to two characteristic elements of Carnival: the act of dressing up and the power of imagination. Projects and sketches are part of the central part of the Grand Gallery, such as studies of J. Cunha for the Salvador carnival and Joana Lira for the street decorations in Recife.

Discussions about the party's working conditions are presented in the core Jobs, in which works are presented that bring to light the representation of workers.

The relationship between carnival and urban or rural space appears in the core City through representations of blocks, cordons, afoxés and other forms of processions. The center brings together works such as photographs taken by Diego Nigro in the Galo da Madrugada carnival block (2025).

Finally, the core The ability to  celebrates the meetings of sugarcane workers in Pernambuco transforming themselves into kings and queens of maracatu, as well as black women and marginalized peripheral groups becoming, for a few days, the figures of command during the festival in Bahia: Ebony Goddesses, Reis Momos, Carnival Queens.

Service
Exhibition Carnival Work
From November 8, 2025 to April 12, 2026
Wednesday to Monday, from 10:18 to XNUMX:XNUMX

A DM Mendes Wood We are pleased to present the exhibition. Birth & Standardization de Antonio Oba, which occupies the entire gallery space in Barra Funda with new and emblematic works. The works, developed using distinct techniques such as painting, drawing, installation, and film, continue the artist's investigation into the construction of national identity, and its contradictions and influences, through icons and symbols present in Brazilian culture.

The exhibition's title stems from the idea of ​​birth as a marker of a moment, of a new existence on Earth. This miraculous event also carries the counterpart of fortune and luck, which accompanies us from conception. For Obá, “Being subject to this is not about a choice. Being subject to this is about an irreverence towards the inevitable. So, what we can do is demarcate these various fortunes through rite, celebration, symbol, and language.”

Each work that makes up the exhibition contributes to this attempt to situate the idea of ​​luck, fortune, sometimes as a prayer, sometimes as a ritual that celebrates it.

An unprecedented installation, located in an enclosed space at the back of the gallery, directly refers to the idea of ​​play and luck. In it, columns of cowrie shells spill over gilded bronze sieves, carrying ceramic eggs painted red. The cowrie shells represent elements of an attempt to read luck, destiny, and fate, and symbolize the currency of exchange, which also transforms into an offering. In their arrangement within the space, the cowrie shells form ascending columns, like a territory of spiritual elevation and re-signification of life in the face of its potentially fatalistic aspects.

At the entrance to the exhibition space, a path of swords representing Saint George and Iansã leads to a new installation: an altar with two tree trunks symbolizing the pillory. The trunks are entirely studded with nails—in one, the nails point outwards; in the other, inwards—symbolizing protection and punishment and the difficulty of harmonizing tensions. Between the pillories, cables suspend a bronze head with a plumb bob at the tip. This installation is an offering to the lord of the path, therefore, it has a connection with Exu.

the installation Ka'a porá (2024), presented for the first time in the traveling exhibition Finca-Pé: Stories of the Land At the CCBB in Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte, and Brasília, it occupies a prominent place in the exhibition. Sculptures of feet, representing both the human foot and that of a tree, emphasize the connection with the ground. The configuration of the work resembles a small garden, with trunks arranged in a seemingly random way, each suggesting a different direction within a labyrinth. The title of the installation derives from the Tupi term. ka'a porá, which refers to an individual who settles and anchors themselves to the land. The expression also alludes to the mythical figure of Caipora, protector of the forests in Brazilian indigenous mythology. Another symbolic element of the installation revisits the concept of pruning, understood here as an act of violence that breaks with life and nature.

Paintings of varying sizes and techniques compose the visual narrative of the exhibition. A set of 22 small-format paintings presents Obá's interpretation of the Tarot. In these works, the artist uses a mixture of techniques along with gold leaf, giving a unique magical and fantastical tone to the oracle cards. In addition to these, the exhibition includes new large-scale paintings, as well as a work painted directly onto one of the walls of the exhibition space. In these pieces, figures and symbols that make up Brazilian identity suggest new interpretations. The exhibition also includes previously unseen drawings made with charcoal, India ink, pencil, and tempera on canvas.

The film Charmed (2024) presents a performance by the artist that proposes reflections on symbolic systems — especially religious ones. The performative action evokes a ritualistic perspective, centered on the figure of the pilgrim, who, in his gesture, synthesizes elements of belief, culture and tradition associated with the imagery of the pilgrim.

With this collection of works, which spans different media and symbolisms, the exhibition reaffirms the power of Antonio Obá's production in constructing a poetics that investigates identity, territory, and spirituality.

Service
Exhibition Birth
From November 8th March 14, 2026
Tuesday to Friday, from 11 am to 19 pm, Saturday from 10 am to 17 pm

A DAN Gallery presents the exhibition Brazil during the Modernist period, curated by Maria Alice MillietGathering around 50 works emblematic of fundamental names such as Tarsila do Amaral, Di Cavalcanti, Cícero Dias, Victor Brecheret, Cândido Portinari, Guignard, Alfredo Volpi, Anita Malfatti Among others, the collective exhibition traces an overview of modern art in the country and highlights the role of the movement that, starting in the 1920s, redefined the national artistic language and added updated visions of the Brazilian popular imagination to the collective imagination.

The Brazil of the Modernists takes as its starting point the transformations that marked the emergence of artistic modernity in Brazil, a movement that consolidated itself in the confrontation between cultural conservatism and the impulse for renewal of a country in transition. The Modern Art Week of 1922 is revisited here as a symbolic landmark of this clash: booed by the public, it exposed the resistance to new languages ​​and the rupture with traditional standards, inaugurating a production focused on aesthetic updating and the construction of a Brazilian artistic identity.

The curatorial journey portrays how the first modernists, in search of training and recognition, turned to the great artistic centers of Europe. It was from this experience that many began to perceive the strength and originality of Brazilian cultural diversity in the construction of their own artistic identities. “Our modernists didn't need to seek in exotic places the popular or ethnic content that so enchanted Europeans. They found in our landscapes and customs the ingredients for the constitution of a visuality of national character,” affirms curator Maria Alice Milliet.

Although influenced by European avant-garde movements, modern art in Brazil remained faithful to figuration. Contact with the "return to order" movement in the interwar period led artists to explore expressionist, cubist, and later surrealist languages, in a process that defined the aesthetic foundations of early Brazilian modernism.

Among the highlights of the exhibition is the Portrait of Judite (1944), by Alfredo Volpi. Painted in the year the artist married Benedita da Conceição, known as Judite, the work depicts his wife nude between curtains, with open arms, as if presenting the paintings that surround her. Volpi, who began his career decorating São Paulo facades, developed his own language, marked by geometrization and the refined use of color. His work symbolizes the transition from figurative painting to a mature, enlightened modernity with a strong Brazilian identity.

“It is undeniable that Tarsila, Di Cavalcanti, Cícero Dias, Rego Monteiro, Brecheret, Portinari, and Guignard constituted an iconographic corpus identified with Brazil. More than that, modernism added to the national imagination updated visions of our sociocultural reality. In other words, when we think of Brazilian women, the sensuality of the dark-haired women painted by Di Cavalcanti comes to mind; the history of the conquest of our territory is realized in Brecheret's Monument to the Bandeiras; our myths are those of Tarsila; our beaches are those of Pancetti; and popular festivals find their best expression in the colorful little flags of Volpi,” adds Maria Alice Milliet regarding the exhibition's theme.

By bringing together fundamental works from the period, the exhibition "Brazil of the Modernists" highlights the historical and cultural relevance of the movement that redefined the course of art in the country. The group show reinforces the role of this generation of artists in building a visual identity and reaffirms the continued relevance of their legacy in shaping what is understood as Brazilianness.

Artists present

Alberto da Veiga Guignard, Alfredo Volpi, Anita Malfatti, Candido Portinari, Cícero Dias, Emiliano Di Cavalcanti, Ernesto De Fiori, Ismael Nery, José Pancetti, Tarsila do Amaral, Vicente do Rego Monteiro, and Victor Brecheret.

Service
Exhibition Brazil during the Modernist period
From November 19th to January 19th
Monday to Friday, from 10 am to 19 pm, Saturdays from 10 am to 13 pm.

A central figure in the history of cinema, with films that have marked generations. Agnès Varda (1928–2019) is also the author of an extensive photographic production, having even begun her career as a photographer. Over the years, she established herself as a filmmaker, but photography remained present in her trajectory, whether in her films or in the artistic installations she produced in the 21st century. This facet of her work, still less known to the public, is presented in the exhibition Photography AGNÈS VARDA Cinema, which opens on IMS Paulista, with free entry.

The exposure Photography AGNÈS VARDA Cinema The exhibition brings together approximately 200 photographs taken by Varda, primarily between the 1950s and 1960s. The collection includes images captured during her travels, including previously unseen photographs from China in 1957, photos from Cuba in the post-revolutionary context, and from the USA, where the artist documented the Black Panthers. There are also photos taken in Paris, such as those of a play staged by the Griots, the city's first Black theatre company. In dialogue with these photographs, the exhibition presents excerpts from the artist's films, emphasizing how social commitment, an affectionate gaze, and humor characterize her work.

Service
Exhibition | Photography AGNÈS VARDA Cinema
From November 29th to April 12th, 2026
Tuesday to Sunday and holidays from 10am to 20pm (closed on Mondays)