José Almeida Pereira ‘Simulabor’

We walk towards the obsolescence of physical labor.
How will our brains behave facing the idea of ​​the sedentary body, of permanent free time?
Does an artist work or create? Can he create without working?
Are we dispensable beings for the systems that are being planned?
How will we renew the individual pleasure of building a project and the satisfaction of seeing it come true?

The models of this exhibition are images of figurative paintings, from other times, representations of effort and physical activity (Tiziano, Vermeer, Millet). The radical and geometric abstraction of the beginning of the 20th century is also invoked, an incomplete project, aimed at freeing humans from the moorings and conventions invested to the senses by the status quo (Ilya Chashnik, Malevitch and El Lissitzky).

These seemingly antagonistic visual references are pretexts to construct contemporary paintings or specters of something that will happen, the transformation that a world of screens can insinuate to the real.

Although he has already participated in collective exhibitions, this is the first individual show by José Almeida Pereira at Graça Brandão Gallery.

The exhibition is complemented with works by Cristina Regadas and Max Fernandes. The introduction of these artists’ work represents an enlargement of the reasons to exhibit. Where does authorship begin and end? All the exhibited works were created in parallel, there was no contact between the artists. The desire to see them together comes from the observation of overly coincident relationships in order to avoid a dialogue.

Galeria Graça Brandão (press release)