Eduardo Matos

Contact: eduardomatos00@gmail.com

Eduardo Matos (1970), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, lives and works Helsinki

You are all invited to my next exhibition at the Irène Laub Gallery in Brussels with the Greek artist Eirene Efstathiou.

http://irenelaubgallery.com/
09.03.17 > 14.04.17

How to express what is seen and transmit it through the realization of the image itself? It is in the ability to conjure up micro events in the margins of the dominant writing – as a means to induct a subjective reading – that the works of Eirene Efstathiou and Eduardo Matos meet. Slowing down and taking the time to look around oneself and see what is happening. Eduardo Matos’ installation «Lamp’s Explanation» incites this introspection. This research emerged in the solitude of his Brussels apartment in a spirit of resistance towards the outside world. That which he tries to escape nonetheless permeates his everyday life. The play of city lights is projected onto the white walls of his studio. Eduardo Matos draws the way he paints. He covers the papers with a thin layering of colors, much like the glazes of the masters of the fifteenth century. It is the temperature and brightness of these, often artificial, lights, that he tries to capture in these two new series of drawings. Sometimes the details of his apartment are included in these attempts that connect interior and exterior. In the series of drawings «No. 3 Map trace» (2016), Eirene Efstathiou, for her part, shows an interest in the protests of July 1965 that occurred prior to the Greek coup. On the pages of an old teaching atlas colored in by children, the artist juxtaposes photographs from archives and post-war statistical annotations that describe the material losses under the Occupation. This process, in which documentary values intersect with their subjective interpretation, draws attention to the way historical events and data are manipulated and misrepresented by the media to serve a contemporary political narrative. A similar approach is used in her paintings. By juxtaposing Greek historical and media images from December 1944 and 2008, Eirene Efstathiou reflects on the politically charged events of these two Decembers. The result is a semantic blur caused by a loss of context that would allow an interpretation of facts. These representations leave room for visions of ruins and absence. Alongside his drawings, Eduardo Matos presents a video that replays a process conceived in the framework of the work «Lamp Explanation». A loop shows the empty space of his apartment where a choreography of anonymous objects unfolds. They appear and disappear according to the cyclical movement of the camera. Absence is a key concept in the intimate observations the artist makes. She calls into question that which is seen, that which should be seen, the way we understand these images and the world around us.

‘Regarding the continuity of disrupted images’ questions the way in which images circulate, the lack of references relating to them, but also the perception we have of them. In the face of the uncertainty produced by the superabundance of information, should we not slow down and take the time to question these unanimous visions? The gaze of Eirene Efstathiou, always on the fringe of the dominant discourse, confronts the impossibility of a representation of violence and chaos. Eduardo Matos, on the other hand, resists the excesses of society through an introspective process. Whether addressing a specific problem or the truncated reports of public demonstrations, the questions raised in the works of Eirene Efstathiou and Eduardo Matos transcend the anecdote and speak of a common history.

Reliquia cadaver" at Galerie der kunster in Munich 2016

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Dear all,
On the 19th of February I opened a solo show at Pedro Oliveira Gallery Porto, Portugal.

Metal Explanation
Cap. B e C. The Intruders and Without Electricity...
From 20 Feb. until 26 Mar.
More info: http://galeriapedrooliveira.com/press/eduardo_matos_2016.htm

The end

“Lamp’s Explanation”

By André Cepeda and Eduardo Matos

The work of André Cepeda and Eduardo Matos shows us different options, developed by each of them over more than a decade. André Cepeda more focused and loyal to the photographic work, and Eduardo Matos with a research that brings into dialogue different media in a same space of sensible experience. Although at first glance the work of both, that is, the language, the themes and, somehow, the space of affirmation of their works, tells us that we are facing two distinct authors, Cepeda and Matos have shared experiences and developed common work, such as the artistic residency in 2010, in Brussels, which resulted in the project “Kanal”.

In “Lamp’s Explanation”, exhibition which now opens at Galeria Pedro Oliveira, the authors resume a dialogue that has accompanied them. This time the gallery’s space is the common place where Cepeda’s pictures and Matos’ drawings and video inhabit the space in a possible dialogue. Added to this, parallel to the exhibition, Cepeda and Matos curate a program of performance and sound: António Olaio, Gustavo Sumpta, Luís Lopes and Vera Mota join the “Lamp’s Explanation” with their sounds, gestures and movements.

"My friend André

I've been here dealing with my stuff, trying to figure out what can I offer you in exchange for the pictures you have sent me. I wonder what place is the one which your pictures thoroughly realize, inescapable fatality it seems to me...

I do see the times are not for optimism. The dust and the metal bring a bitter taste to my saliva.

The drizzly racket that has settled around us, in the public life, in the streets, in the cafes, in the newspapers and television doesn’t let me confused, but also doesn’t satisfy the wickedness that I am capable of. That we are all capable of.

By desire, I'm confined to a physical and mental space that does not go beyond the 12m² of my studio in Brussels, where I now live. On top of this situation, the white walls of my studio, which is also my home, insinuate themselves with a nocturnal satin sheen as if it were an issue. It seems little to me, but it is what it is, I'm not for more. As you see, it does not foretell for big incursions.

We are friends and we have a lot in common, but friendship is also made of silences and little violence. Therefore, I see no reason why the exhibition that we now prepare isn’t like that as well."

Some pictures of my work at the Bienal da Maia 2015 , Portugal

Maia

»»» On 24th January I will present the video argant.
At CCVF Guimarães, Portugal.
»Território de Trabalho » Laboratório das artes 10 anos

»»» Argant » 2010 » Video projection: HD, Color, Mute, 6’12’’

The title of this piece comes from the word “garganta” (throat in portuguese). In the video objects are treated as sculptural mass. For Georges Bataille the “informe” is the first moment which defines what was rejected and excluded from Western metaphysics. The indefinable, an anti-concept, not so much a theme but more a substance.

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André Cepeda e Eduardo Matos

Kanal project at Standart/deluxe _ Lausanne _Suíça

ENG

Dear reader,

Please allow me two introductory remarks before going any further. This project, carried out with André Cepeda, is the result of our time as artists-in-residence at Contretype in Brussels. As you can imagine, speaking on behalf of both of us is not easy, especially because we began work on the project back in April 2011. When we decided to do a project about the canal, we were faced with a reality so complex and rich in terms of possible representations that we felt that our hesitations, back-tracking and the decisions we took as we went along were part of a context that was itself elusive and fluid. You should be aware that these continual difficulties gave a structure to the results of the project that form this exhibition. At first, we intended to cover the entire length of the canal in Brussels. We started at Verbrande-Brug, to the north of the city, a sort of mythical place that no longer exists as we found it. We came across people living in boats on the canal; we met Little Jimmy, a man from the golden age of rock’n’roll and spoke with someone who introduced himself as “the last captain of the harbour”. Progress has come to their doorstep, and soon all those who live in boats will be forced to leave. “There is no place for us anymore, no place for dreaming, for poetry”, one of them explained.We spent some time in the scrap car-dealers’ neighbourhood, where things that were invisible were hinted at, and we went to the North Sea. Further south, we drove to Charleroi while listening to the raw, melodic guitars of Neil Young and Earth, and then wandered aimlessly around the city for a while.This experience reminded us of another trip we’d done together along the Mississippi in the Deep South of the United States; it reminded us of the presence of music in the landscape, places and people. A strange feeling took hold of us: somehow some places in Belgium resemble the United States... As they say there, the canal is an invisible boundary that crosses and divides the city of Brussels. It is an extraordinary place of change and experimentation in which the atmosphere and landscape metamorphose into strata of a matrix of indecipherable meaning. Even before I went there, I had already imagined a landscape built and manipulated by many layers of information. At the very moment I am writing these words, huge changes are taking place all across it, producing an energy matrix that will completely change it. The landscape is doubly artificial, where demolition, reconstruction and environmental redevelopment will create a cold, pragmatically modern landscape, with an energy that will be impossible to ignore. In a way, we had created our own expectations, ideas and visions about this landscape, and we were anxious to simply experience the passing of time in such a huge structure: the movement, speed, rhythm and repetition that it generated- all things that are increasingly distancing us from nature. With time, the first images appeared. One of André’s photographs attracted my attention and I can even say that it changed the direction of our project. The image is of an open book on a wooden table. Observing it closely, we see that what is printed on the pages is a map, and looking even closer, we see that it is a map of the city of Brussels. In the lower part of the image, we feel the texture of the floor. Also on the table we see an empty coffee cup and, in the upper left-hand corner, another book, probably an encyclopaedia. Although the image depicts concrete objects, its inherent degree of abstraction was to us raw evidence that what certain images conceal about themselves is often more significant than what we think we can see on the surface. We know that this project misses out countless things that we did not notice, were not aware of, or that we simply ignored. But, as in life, looking the other way may have led us to focus on, and intensify, what is important. Therefore, in this exhibition we have imagined a place where images and objects, sound, video and performance, become a narrative of time that enhance our expectations.

Eduardo Matos, Bruxelas 2011 translation: Rui Parada

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“Lamp’s Explanation”

At Galeria Pedro Oliveira, Oporto Portugal » November » 2013

"My friend André

I do see the times are not for optimism. The dust and the metal bring a bitter taste to my saliva.

We are friends and we have a lot in common, but friendship is also made of silences and little violence. Therefore, I see no reason why the exhibition that we now prepare isn’t like that as well."

Video » frame