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Henrique Oliveira

Henrique Oliveira

Memento Habilis, 2023 (detail) | Photo: Ana Pigosso

1973, Ourinhos, Brazil
Lives and works in London, UK

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about

In the form of paintings, sculptures or installations, the hybrid art of Henrique Oliveira evokes both the urban and the natural, the organic and the structural, as well as art and science, through compositions in which the unexpected generates a universe tinted with the fantastic. Having graduated from the University of São Paulo in 1997, the artist explores fluidity, the combination and color of materials, which endows his installations with a certain pictorial quality. Oliveira often borrows materials from the urban landscape, notably construction hoarding – wood taken from fences surrounding and blocking access to construction sites. By using these materials, Oliveira’s installations highlight the endemic and parasitic nature of precarious housing constructions functioning as a metaphor for organic growth, thus revealing the dynamic decay present in cosmopolitan cities in the urban fabric around the world.

Oliveira was the winner of the third edition of the CNI SESI Marcantonio Vilaça Award (Brazil), in 2009. He had solo exhibitions in important spaces including Centro Cultural São Paulo, SP, Brazil (2018) and Gifu Museum of Fine Arts, Gifu, Japan (2018); Van de Weghe Gallery, New York, USA (2017); Anexo Millan, São Paulo, Brazil (2016); Galerie Georges-Phillipe & Nathalie Vallois, Paris, France (2015); Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil, and Arthur Ross Gallery – University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA (2014); Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France (2013); and Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Boulder, USA (2011), among others.

The artist also participated in several group shows, including: La Forêt Magique, Palais Lille Beaux Arts, Lille, France (2022); Triennale Brugge 2021, Bruges, Belgium (2021); Pinacoteca: Acervo, Pinacoteca do Estado, São Paulo, Brazil (2020); Arte Sella, Borgo Valsugana, Itály and Un Été au Havre – Jardins Suspendu, Le Havre, France (2019); The End of the World, Centro Pecci, Prato, Italy and The Other Side – Narratives of the Unconscious, Wilhelm Hack Museum, Ludwigshafen, Germany (2017); XIII Bienal de Cuenca, Ecuador (2016); Crafted: Object in Flux, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA (2015); Momento fecundo, Domaine de Chaumont-sur-Loire, Chaumont-sur-Loire, France (2014); Inside Out and from the Ground Up, Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland, USA (2012); Art in Brazil (1950 – 2011), Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, Belgium and Artists in Dialogue 2: Sandile Zulu and Henrique Oliveira, Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, Washington, USA (2011); 29th Bienal de São Paulo, Brazil (2010); and Grito e Escuta, 7th Mercosul Biennial, Porto Alegre, Brazil (2009).

His work is featured in important public collections, such as those of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, USA; Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Coleção Museu Afro-Brasil, São Paulo, Brazil; Fundação Edson Queiroz – Universidade de Fortaleza, Brazil; Centro Luigi Pecci per L’Arte Contemporanea, Prato, Italy; Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil; Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art – Brisbane, Australia; and Voorlinden Museum & Gardens, Wassenaar, The Netherlands, among others.

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