hal_wildson | galeria movimento

HAL WILDSON

Barra do Garças, MT - 1991

Lives and works in São Paulo, SP

Multimedia artist and poet, born in 1991 in the Araguaia Valley (Barra do Garças/MT - Aragarças/GO), a border region between Goiás and Mato Grosso, a well-known route and gateway to the Legal Amazon, a crucial place to understand the essence and motivations of his work.

His research emerges from his experience in the backlands of the center-west, marked by the configuration of his mixed-race and marginalized family, the artist investigates the construction of Brazil by confronting the projects of identity, memory and oblivion that sustain official history, as he seeks answers about its own origin.

In 2022, Hal Wildson received the Artistic Residency Award at the Salão Nacional Arte Pará 40th Edition, held by the Inclusartiz Institute, in Rio de Janeiro. And in 2019, he won first place in the “Art on paper” category at SESI Arte e Criatividade (Goiás) with the work “Amidst the ruins, the reconstruction”.

obras

works

"REFLORESTAR O IMAGINÁRIO" SERIES

The series “Reforesting the Imagination” carries poems in the form of flags. The hoisted phrases reflect the theme, through the artistic poetic perception, of “reforesting” the imagination of the Amazon and generating knowledge capable of creating new horizons beyond the ongoing project of erasure since 1500. The paths of the rivers in the hydrographic basins that flow through Brazil and neighboring countries are important elements that, When embroidered on the flags, visually complement the printed poems and invite us to understand the riverbeds as constant threads of memory.

The series highlights the importance of knowledge and the preservation of forests as an essential part of our ancestry.

Reflorestar

1/2

Reflorestar
Double-sided embroidery on Oxford fabric
Edition: 5
90 x 128 cm
2023

"ID DOCUMENTS" SERIES

A carteira de identidade oficializa, com uma foto 3 x 4 da bandeira e um mapa no lugar da impressão digital, a herança colonizadora, escravocrata e conservadora do Brasil. Neste trabalho, Hal Wildson, nascido no Vale do Araguaia, região fronteiriça de Goiás e Mato Grosso, investiga documentos pessoais e oficiais como ferramentas de manipulação de memórias. O artista discute como a criação do Brasil foi moldada por ficções e projetos de poder, permeada por uma história oficial controlada pelo olhar do opressor. O documento torna se suporte para a oficialização das formas de apagamentos sociais e o estado de crise de suas instituições, colocando em questão a formação e a identidade do povo, dentro de uma noção imposta de identidade nacional.

(Revista SeLect edição 2022 (Arte e Política), texto Luana Rosiello

"UTOPIA ORIGINAL" SERIES

Through the concept of Utopia (whose etymology means "no place"), the idea of a country under construction, and extensive research on popular demonstrations in Brazil, the artist appropriates various public domain images and creates a new image, a "Reinvented Utopia" based on social struggles and public protests. The artist questions the concept and origin of the "Brazilian Utopia" and delves into research using documentation techniques to create a fictional-documentary image, where contemporary issues are debated and the way we tell and document history is questioned.

"REPÚBLICA DA DESIGUALDADE - MERITOCRACIA SEJA LOUVADA" SERIES

This series appropriates the symbolic load of the “ the photographic power of memory records in Brazil as well as the motto of a society that believes in merit as the solution to poverty hunger and lack of opportunities Hal Wildson alludes to the most valuable Real note The works are deliberately bigger than an original ballot showing an illusory speech, worthless and full of promises that has been told to Brazilian people for centuries.

"SINGULARIDADE" SERIES

What determines us as a people?

Is our 'existence document' a CPF, an RG or a fingerprint? What distinguishes us are our differences? Our fingerprint is highlighted in personal documents and serves as a unique stamp of our existence in society, the digital carries unique characteristics of our uniqueness and is used as an identification document. But, as “Brazilian people” what is our brand? What identifies us as an intrinsic brand of Brazil? These are the questions that reinforce this research, the signs of memory and identity intersect as they complement and build. In this work it is possible to see the imagetic construction of this symbolic bridge. There is no identity without memory, the Brazilian is the fruit of his memory and the people are the 'fingerprint' of his country.

What we determine as Brazil is the Brazilian people, our singularities are multiple, we are a Brazil made of “Brazils”.

"RE-UTOPYA" SERIES

In the Tupi-Guarani village in São Sebastião, I dreamed of the expression Re-Utopya written in annatto and palm oil, and the word and its symbolism made me see a flag of Brazil. But, among the stars, it was written: teko porã and ubuntu, replacing the positivist motto “Order and Progress”. In short, teko porã expresses good living in community, a search for balance in the relationship between people and the environment, the ability to regard it as a living and active being. Ubuntu means 'I am because we are'. I am human, and human nature implies compassion, sharing, respect, empathy. So I wrote the Manifesto Re-Utopya, if it was no longer possible to erase the country's past, it was possible to reinvent it.

"AFLUENTES" SERIES

In the series "Afluentes" I expanded the symbols of resistance beyond the "Ipiranga River" and created a Brazil irrigated with rivers of resistance. I appropriate historical photos that populate the popular imagination and give a face to this struggle, the independence of Brazil was more than the "Ipiranga River", literally a lot of water flowed under the bridge for us to reach that moment. Thus, I give indigenous-black-ancestral faces to this battle. The works in the series are named after rivers and streams that supplied Quilombos and villages, the same rivers that mark the territory of Brazil and that symbolically resemble veins irrigated with blood and struggle during centuries of resistance.

"SINGULARIDADE" SERIES

What determines us as a people?

What we determine as Brazil is the Brazilian people, our singularities are multiple, we are a Brazil made of “Brazils”.

"MONUMENTO À INDEPENDÊNCIA" SERIES

While the Independence Anthem announced a new time for a "new" Brazil that had now freed itself from the chains of Portugal, more than half a million enslaved people still dreamed of the word freedom so distant from the nation that was being formed. After the Ipiranga shout on September 7th, 1822, independent Brazil sang its freedom to the world, but it was still under the reins of the monarchy, benefiting from the slavery system and laying the foundations for an extremely unequal society designed to maintain the privileges of the elite.

This was an important chapter to understand the Brazil we are today, with independence also came the urgency to create a concept of what "it is to be Brazilian" and to build a nation without any cracks.

On November 16, 1822, the imperial flag was adopted as one of the symbols of Independence, a flag that was reformulated after the coup that established the Republic in Brazil 67 years later. If the purpose of a flag is to unite the people through a national symbol, the history behind the creation of these symbols can say a lot about the narratives that shape a nation.

Focusing on these concepts and symbols under construction, I critically recreate 5 flag projects that "honors" 200 years of Brazilian Independence, seeking to synthesize this national identity through fictional caricatures that blend with reality.