Spray Jet (1986)

Leonilson: Self

Photos 

Quotes 

• Leonilson : There was a time when it was said that the paintings are over, and that the art was gone. But painting was never forgotten. There were painters who kept going, and the pop art is responsible for its continuation, I think. It kept this tradition of ink over a canvas. Life and art are part of the leap in the abyss that I decided to give. To live I need to paint. It's my way of spending the days, you know. We gotta live, right? And I had to find a nice way to live. I have this idea that when one says "What'll be your profession?" instead the person should ask "What is gonna be the best form of a nice way for you to live?".

• Leonilson : The economy in this century changed of hands and ways several times. And along with the economy, people's heads started to change and the art was conceptual. And with all that conceptual art which ruled our education, we had here in Tropicalismo in Brazil. Tropicalismo subverted everything. When we got disillusioned with the game of conceptual paradoxes, we discovered that we were free to do any kind of art. We don't need to use metaphors because that time is gone. We had to kill this conceptual father for good in order to creat this new thing that we are doing... which is also conceptual but it's not just that.

• [last lines] 

  Leonilson : And art is always like an antenna. And I think things happen first in the art then later in the world. And the movie is a witness and it feels as if I'm writing part of something. I think it's a movie, a document of an instant... and I don't know if matters all that much. Just as it isn't important for the work to remain. That's the heart of the matter. The work is done, it's concluded.

• Leonilson : We're at the end of the century and the ideas are renewing, recycling. And a whole new generation of artists are taking care of that. They're recycling such energy that was shattered. And that's fruit of chaos, the great storm that the world goes through. Everything's not gathered yet but awareness is being made and the result of that will be positive times in the future.