Japaratuba, SE, Brazil, 1909 – Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil, 1989
Arthur Bispo do Rosário’s creative process is a meticulous exercise of re-elaboration, motivated by the call he received to make an inventory of the world for Judgement Day. And so he started to weave a cosmogony with the aim of representing the totality of the material world with as much detail and particularities as possible, relying on the scarce resources he had at hand.
The maritime works by him on display here make up an important part of his output, and refer to an environment he knew intimately. Among the few things that are known about his biography is the fact that he entered the school for apprentice sailors in Sergipe in 1925, at the age of 15. When he moved to Rio de Janeiro, he enlisted in the War Navy and remained there for nine years. In 1982, the MAM Rio was the first art institution to show Bispo do Rosário’s creations, and his participation in the current exhibition is the start of a series of collaborations between MAM Rio and the Museu Bispo do Rosário that will take place throughout 2025.