Erika Verzutti: The Indiscipline of Sculpture
2021
Published by Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand17.5 x 25 cm256 pagesHardbackISBN 9786557770092
Published on the occasion of ‘The Indiscipline of Sculpture’ (2021), a major solo exhibition of work by Erika Verzutti at Museu de arte de São Paulo (MASP), Brazil, this comprehensive catalogue is edited by Adriano Pedrosa and André Mesquita and includes texts from André Mesquita, Dorota Biczel, Fernanda Brenner, Paulo Herkenhoff and Ruba Katrib.
Verzutti is a key artist for understanding sculpture practice today, both in the Brazilian panorama and internationally. Her thought-provoking forms explore new routes for the medium, with renewed attention to the origin and materiality of sculpture, its varied references, and its formal intelligence.
Using different materials, such as bronze, concrete, stone, and papier-maché, Verzutti’s works are sensual and tactile, both rough and refined, evoking animals and plants, landscapes and minerals, everyday objects and objects of art – from Tarsila do Amaral to Constantin Brancusi and René Magritte to Piero Manzoni. Often with an uncanny character, Verzutti’s sculptures give themselves up to unpredictability, sometimes with a certain degree of humor, refusing to accept pre-established definitions or traditions.
Published by MASP and designed by Bloco Gráfico, this is the most thorough publication on Verzutti’s work to date. Mirroring the structure of the concurrent exhibition, the book is divided into seven organisational chapters: ‘Becoming-Animal’, ‘Tropical Pathway’, ‘World Metaphor’, ‘Totemize the Taboo’, ‘Wild Modernism’, ‘Under Tarsila’s Sun (and Other Stories)’ and ‘Strangely Familiar’. With contributions from international curators, critics and historians, the book establishes Verzutti’s practice as one of the most singular in the field of contemporary sculpture.