José Antônio da Silva at MAC-USP
"Self-Portrait Painting" (1958), by José Antônio da Silva. Collection of MAC-USP.

More than one hundred paintings by the artist are on display at the Museum of Contemporary Art of USP. The exhibition José Antônio da Silva: Painting BrazilThe exhibition, curated by Gabriel Pérez-Barreiro, has already been shown at the Grenoble Museum in France as part of the Brazil-France Season 2025, and at the Iberê Camargo Foundation in Porto Alegre. 

There are 142 works by Silva on display, 119 of which are from the MAC-USP collection, which has housed the artist's work since its founding and holds the largest collection of his work in the country. Since 1963, Silva has had 7 solo exhibitions and at least 34 group exhibitions at the Museum.

Pérez-Barreiro emphasizes that the works do not intend to offer a chronology or a retrospective of the artist, but rather to explore the different themes of his work and how Silva chose to portray them over the decades. 

José Antônio da Silva at MAC-USP
“Algodoal com troncos decepados” (1975), by José Antônio da Silva. Fernanda Feitosa and Heitor Martins Collection. Credit: Sérgio Guerini.

The exhibition is divided into eight thematic sections covering the main subjects of Silva's work: portraits, rural life, fields, wildfires, still lifes, rain, religious scenes, and works on paper. According to Pérez-Barreiro, the organization was conceived to highlight the artist's spontaneity – it didn't make sense to approach his work through a rigid or chronological structure. “He often returned to the same subjects; he could paint one picture from the 1950s and another from the 1980s, and they would dialogue with each other. He is a very spontaneous artist, so we wanted to respect that,” he states.

His works depict many of the social and urban transformations of 20th-century Brazil – the destruction of nature, the advance of agriculture and livestock farming in the interior of São Paulo, the industrialization of the countryside with the arrival of railroads and industries. He frequently painted cotton, coffee, and sugarcane crops, sometimes lined up to the horizon, as in... cotton (1972), sometimes accompanied by rural workers, as in Shaking Cotton (1975) 

José Antônio da Silva at MAC-USP
“Batendo Algodão” (1975) by José Antônio da Silva.
Vilma Eid Collection. Credit: João Liberato.

However, Painting Brazil He seeks to demonstrate that his work is not limited to the rural universe: it includes still lifes, in which the expressive stroke, composed of quick brushstrokes, is observed; religious scenes, such as Entrance to Jerusalem, from 1968; portraits, such as that of his wife Rosinha (1957), painted with vibrant colors and in the style of pointillism; and self-portraits, such as self-portrait(1973). In this work, the artist's ironic and critical tone is evident: over his mouth, there is a strip with the inscription: "This mouth is tied. It was the Biennial that tied me up. Look." His hands, also tied, hold a paintbrush on which is written, in another strip: "Freedom, I paint what I like and I like what I paint." 

José Antônio da Silva at MAC-USP
“Self-Portrait” (1973) by José Antônio da Silva.
Orandi Momesso Collection. Credit: Sérgio Guerini.

The MAC-USP also features 23 more works than those exhibited in Grenoble and Porto Alegre, originating from the institution's collection and selected by the Museum's professor and art historian Fernanda Pitta. Of particular note are the 75 drawings created to illustrate Silva's first book. Romance of My LifeOf these, 40 were published in the 1949 edition of the Museum of Modern Art, which had recently been created at the time, and coordinated by Carlos Pinto Alves, one of the institution's founding partners. The other 35 remained unpublished until now; this exhibition is the first in which the complete collection is on display.

“The drawings condense a poetics of memory: Silva narrates and illustrates episodes of his life, transforming them,” states Pitta in the book accompanying the exhibition. According to the curator, the works not only accompany the text but also “expand its dramatic impact,” condensing pivotal moments of the narrative and foreshadowing the visual vocabulary that would become recurrent in his painting. Romance of My LifeSilva is simultaneously the protagonist and narrator, subject and agent of his own story, inaugurating a literary career that would continue with titles such as Mary Clare, from 1970, Alice, from 1972, I am a painter, I am a poet., by 1982, and Farm Good HopeOf 1987. 

Other works in paper, India ink, and gouache are also on display. Among them are... Anaconda eating oxThe exhibition features a 1958 work and a large, untitled ink drawing from 1950, depicting a rural scene of two men driving oxcarts. "We sought to highlight the diversity of media used in Silva's work, who is best known for his paintings on canvas, as well as to show that his early works already reveal both his style and his poetics and themes, demonstrating an artist conscious of his practice and interests," says Pitta. 

José Antônio da Silva
"Anaconda Eating Ox" (1958), by José Antônio da Silva.
MAC-USP Collection.

Pérez-Barreiro points out that, although Silva's style has been consistent over the decades, his early works presented a relatively simple formal resolution, with more muted colors and a predominance of earthy tones. Through experimentation, Silva began to incorporate more intense colors and a freer brushstroke. "The latter part of his production, from the 1980s onwards, shows that he has total control of the brush and the colors. Silva jumps from one style to another with absolute confidence in his stroke," says the curator.

The works of Silva, also known as the “Brazilian Van Gogh,” were commonly labeled as “primitive” or “naïve” due to the artist's lack of formal art training and the predominance of rural themes in his work. Curators reject this assessment: the artist was aware of his value and formal resources. “[He] claimed agency: he wrote, painted, debated prices, created museums, and established himself alongside Picasso and Van Gogh as a modern 'genius',” states Pitta. The “popular” in Silva is not folkloric repose, but historical movement and social consciousness.”

Curator Pérez-Barreiro points out that knowing a bit about Silva's history is essential to better understanding his work. Before establishing himself as a painter, the artist worked in various rural occupations and experienced poverty and hardship. "He could live in Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, or abroad, but he continues to live in the countryside. It's a political gesture, a defense of the value of this rural life and culture." 

According to the curator, Silva saw himself as a suitable representative of Brazilian art. An example is when he was excluded from the São Paulo Biennial in 1957 – the organizing committee claimed that his pointillism lacked the spontaneity supposedly appropriate to a “primitive” artist. In response, he painted the canvas... Hanging, completed in 1967. In the work, he portrays himself in the center and, hanging from a gallows, the five critics who rejected him from the Biennial. “He states that they don’t know Brazil. It’s a very relevant debate today about who represents the country and who can speak on its behalf. He felt like a marginalized voice but absolutely authorized to speak about this reality.” 

José Antônio da Silva
José Antônio da Silva's painting kit.

The artist, who frequently referred to himself in the third person, often stated things like: “Who doesn’t know Silva? Silva is me. Silva is rural nature” and “Nature is with me and I am with nature. Nature is my God and I am Silva.” His work appropriates various national symbols – an example is his painting case, exhibited at the MAC, decorated with a Brazilian flag painted by himself. “If today we have a great debate between cosmopolitanism and regionalism, he was already talking about these things in the last century,” points out Pérez-Barreiro.

Born in Sales de Oliveira, in the interior of São Paulo state, the artist exhibited for the first time in São José do Rio Preto, the city where he resided until 1973. His life changed after his works, painted on flannel, caught the attention of the jury of a competition at the Casa de Cultura in São José do Rio Preto in 1946. Two years later, he debuted his first solo exhibition at the Domus Gallery in São Paulo. It was the beginning of a meteoric trajectory: over the next few years, he exhibited in several shows throughout Brazil, in editions of the São Paulo Biennial, and also twice at the Venice Biennale – in 1966, a Special Room was dedicated to his work.


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