This is the first large installation by artist Ana Norogrando (Brazil, 1951-Lives and works Porto Alegre-Brazil and Aveiro-Portugal). The Feminist Aquaflux Submarine is a multimodal installation by artist Ana Norogrando that was conceived as a metaphorical construction that invokes the interior of a submarine entitled aquaflux. This interiority creates an external parallelism with the museum space where it is installed, not only by this metaphorical construction, but through its connection with the reality of the so-called “art system”, represented here by the specific longitudinal space of the Gallery PeP of the National Museum of Contemporary Art (MNAC). The work was conceived as a repository of ideas and concepts, as a platform for sensorial experimentation, with the goal of collaborating to build a “historiography of the senses”, in a non-illustrative way, with the employment of conceptual devices related to the senses. In this installation, the artistic form and the invention of design are expressed through the fatura (faktura-фактура) of its objects and elements, and mediated through the historical artistic modalities (sculpture, painting, drawing, photography, etc.) and, finally, activated by the operational introduction of the metaphor of a “feminist submarine” in the construction of form and its existence in space, within a space-time/aqueous relationship. Aspects such as the material reality of object, the semantic structure of the form, the specificity of the craftsmanship, the design of shapes, the modes of display and the conceptual and metaphorical performativity of the senses, considering their historical determination and perception, are some of the determinants of this artistic project. The installation also includes a “soundtrack” entitled SoundMorfose_24, created by musician and sound designer Alfonso Benetti.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
ANA NOROGRANDO [Brasil, 1951 – Vive e trabalha em Porto Alegre-Brasil e Aveiro-Portugal]. Desenvolve projetos em escultura, e instalações multisensoriais. Realizou inúmeras exposições individuais e coletivas no Brasil e exterior, tais como Sobre as Águas no MAC/RS, Sincronias na Sala Janete Costa/PE, a retrospectiva Ana Norogrando - Obras 1968-2013 no MARGS/RS, Corpos e Partes na Fundação Badesc/SC, Corpos de Fábrica no Museu Oscar Niemeyer/PR e Coreografia de Sombras na Galeria Morgados da Pedricosa/Aveiro, Portugal. Participou de inúmeras exposições coletivas como a 10a Bienal do Mercosul – Mensagens de Uma Nova América em 2014, Queermuseu: Cartografias da Diferença na Arte Brasileira em 2017-2018, da Bienal de Valongo, na cidade de Porto, Portugal em 2023.
She participated in solo and group exhibitions in Brazil and abroad, such as In the Waters at MAC/RS in 2011, Synchrony at the Sala Janete Costa/PE in 2013, a retrospective titled Ana Norogrando - Works 1968–2013 at Rio Grande do Sul Museum of Art/RS in 2013. Bodies and Parts at the Badesc Foundation/SC in 2016. and Factory Bodies: Works 2016 – 2017 at the Oscar Niemeyer Museum/PR in 2017. Choreography of Shadows at the Galeria Morgados da Pedricosa/Aveiro/PT in 2021. She also participated in major exhibitions such as the 10th Mercosur Biennial - Messages from New America in 2014 and Queermuseum: Cartographies of Difference in Brazilian Art in 2017, Out of the Shadows at the Oscar Niemeyer Museum/PR, Trama at the Iberê Camargo Foundation/RS and the Valongo Biennial /Porto/Portugal, both in 2023.
ABOUT THE CURATOR
GAUDÊNCIO FIDELIS (Brazilian born, 1965-Lives and works in New York city), is a curator and art historian specialized in modern and contemporary art from the Americas. He holds an M.A. from New York University (NYU) and a Ph.D. in Art History from the State University of New York (SUNY-Binghamton). In 1992 he was the founder and first director of the Rio Grande do Sul Museum of Contemporary Art in Brazil. He published any books including Smell as a Criterion: Toward a Politics of Olfactory Curating (Argos University Publisher, 2015). He has organized and curated more than fifty exhibitions. In 2016 Mr. Fidelis was the director of the Rio Grande do Sul Museum of Art in Brazil (MARGS) from 2011 to 2014. He was curator of the 10th Mercosul Biennial – Messages of a New America in 2015 and Queermuseum: Cartographies of Difference in Brazilian Art in 2017 exhibited in Porto Alegre, at Santander Cultural and in Rio de Janeiro at the Parque Lage School of Visual Arts (EAV). Between 2019-21. He is Adjunct Associate Professor of Art History at the Dept. of Art and Art History at Hunter College.
