CADERNO B - Jornal do Brasil, , Sunday, December 13, 2009

Plastic Arts: The “imageria” of DANIEL AZULAY

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Paris: The artist shows a contemporary art work that ranges from surrealism to pop art.

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By Rodrigo Accioly

Translation by Noêmia Maestrini

There is no doubt: in the last few years, the interest for Brazilian Art has increased in the whole world, as a reflex of talented artists such as , , Ernesto Neto, Beatriz Milhazes, Adriana Varejão, Romero Britto and Cristina Oiticica, to mention only those few highlighted by their works included in relevant art collections overseas. Since 2006, Daniel Azulay has as well gone through an international path which has shown his artworks in one-man exhibitions in Sweden, Finland and Portugal. He was invited to go to as a member of the Brazilian committee organized by the producer Bia Duarte, from São Paulo, in the Salón National des Beaux-Arts, at the Louvre Museum; the exhibition ends today.

The only “carioca”1 representative for the issue of this year, Azulay believes to be carrying out a childhood dream.

1 CARIOCA: a person born and resident in Rio de Janeiro, (t.n.) 2

─ To be in the Louvre, in the company of masterpieces created by one of my great inspirers, the Italian Leonardo Da Vinci is an honor and a delightful.

The creator of the “Lambe‐Lambe Team” says: “To be seen in Europe is like a quality seal (ISO)”.

Although an illustrator since the beginning of his career ─he contributed to the newspapers O Sol, Pasquim, Jornal dos Esportes, Correio da Manhã and Jornal do Brasil─ his devotion to contemporary painting started in the 1990’s decade, when his work began to belong to important collections and Brazilian assets.

─To be seen in Europe was like a quality seal for me and my art work. In Brazil, my image is well associated with the work I’ve developed for many years on TV, and even with praises to my painting I wanted to feel a repercussion only over my paintings, as it happened in Europe. And it was certainly great and surpassed my expectations─ says the artist.

His most recent one-man exhibition, The Door, at the Casa da América Latina, in Lisbon, resulted in acquisitions that stimulated him to go back more frequently to Portugal.

─ Our two peoples, the Brazilian and the Portuguese, have the same cultural roots. My mother was a Portuguese and it was of a great emotion to finally visit the house in which she was born, at Rua do Salitre, # 161, and to remember the stories she used to tell me.

Azulay defines his contemporary art works as an “imageria”, a plural aesthetic of secluded and apparent symbols/significances, not distinguishing the dreams from the reality. His daring/keen traces, warm colors and strong Brazilian identity denote a unique and admirable style that surprises those people who initially knew only his illustrator and cartoonist sides. The work, which in the beginning showed a remarkable link with photography, was step by step flooded by his childhood and youth’s reminiscences.

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PAINTINGS AND CARTOONS ARE COLLECTED AND THIS ASSORTMENT WILL BECOME A BOOK TO BE LAUNCHED IN BRAZIL AND IN EUROPE.

In the art of Azulay it is possible to identify traces which send the spectator to artists that range from Magritte’s surrealism to the dripping and action painting of Pollock, and to the op (optical) art of Vassarely and the pop art of Warhol and Lichtenstein. However, Azulay overpasses these influences when promoting 3D distortions of labels, trademarks and graphic elements into unexpected and abstract forms.

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The artwork of Daniel Azulay has been documented in a bilingual book of art “A Porta” (“The Door”) in English/Portuguese that will be launched simultaneously in Brazil and Europe in 2011. The work will highlight, besides his paintings, remarkable cartoons such as the Jerusalem –Humor Drawings (1974), praised by the columnist Carlos Drummond de Andrade in his chronicle for Jornal do Brasil: “Right now I feel tempted to call Dr. Kissinger’s (US Secretary of State at that time) attention to another Brazilian, Daniel Azulay. If this guy was to be asked to cooperate with him for an agreement between Arabs and Jews, positive results should emerge faster”, wrote the poet.

Along 40 years of career, Azulay became well known as an influent artist on the Brazilian context. By presenting educational programs on TV, in a national network and addressed for almost two decades for a children audience, he became an intimate linked person to the Brazilian affectionate memoire. Today, he maintains alive the social-cultural project “Crescer com Arte” (”Grow with Art”), which educated artistically more than ten thousand destitute children in the Rio-São Paulo axis.

When in Portugal, in October 2009, Azulay integrated his art exhibition with a charity and educational movement. The workshop ”Cotton Candy” had as its public, guests from the institution SOL (Sun), dedicated to the children with HIV:

─”When I arrived, I felt that there was sadness in the children’s look. While I did some magic tricks and drawings, their expression changed into joy” ─ he remembers.

Another important moment in Lisbon was his meeting with the General Consul of Brazil, Renan Paes Barreto. Barreto appreciated the implementation of a serious work of art-education and it’s income generation, led by Daniel who counts on the community of the Brazilian immigrants in Portugal, recognized as the largest overseas.

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FOR FRENCH TO SEE: “Funny wall faces” is one of the paintings exhibited by Daniel Azulay in Paris.

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