The exhibition Carnival as Method investigates the creative processes that shape the samba school parades in Rio de Janeiro, introducing to the museum space the strategies, concepts and languages that result in the parades presented every year. Although Carnival occupies a central place in Brazilian culture and its importance is widely legitimised, its processes aren’t fully recognised in the visual arts field and are still rarely present in museums and cultural institutions.
The exhibition was created by commissioning new works from six active Carnival art directors, who were invited to conceive specific projects for the museum’s Monumental Hall. Alongside these are historical works produced for the Carnival avenue by Maria Augusta Rodrigues, Rosa Magalhães and Joãosinho Trinta. On top of that, a selection of paintings by songwriters, samba musicians and other Carnival artists shows that creative processes are diverse and cross formats and disciplines. In this way, the proposal transforms the exhibition space into a field of experimentation inspired by the creative dynamics of the festival itself, though inverting the logic of the parade: while on the avenue it is the samba school that moves ahead, in the museum it is the audience that moves around to see the works and the installations, redefining the times and modes of engagement.
The exhibition starts from the premise that Carnival art directors are the visual artists responsible for conceiving one of the greatest artistic events of the country: the samba school parades. For this reason, Carnival is not presented as a theme or object, but as a creative method rooted in collaborative and experimental processes. Instead of transposing the parade to the museum, the aim is to acknowledge and study it as an artistic practice, to stimulate new ways of reflecting on its creative processes.
Carnival as Method resumes MAM Rio’s historical relationships with Carnival and the samba schools, but this time explicitly acknowledging their centrality. In this way, it proposes to question the distinctions, categories and hierarchies historically established by the museum and dominant art historical discourses, contributing to the recognition of Carnival art directors as protagonists of artistic production in Brazil.
curated by Raquel Barreto, Pablo Lafuente e Phelipe Rezende
in collaboration with Debora Moraes and Edu Gonçalves