The Independents

The Adolpho Leirner Collection features a number of major artists who embraced Constructive modes yet worked independently from established groups or movements. A diversity of Concrete and abstract styles were set into play during this fervent period of modernization and utopian idealism. The artist María Leontina (1917–1984), for example, meditated on the transition between figuration and abstraction in Os episódios II [The Episodes II] (1959), while, María Helena Andres (b. 1922) produced delicate abstractions based on musical compositions. Milton Dacosta’s (1915–1988) Em vermelho [In Red] (1958), with its broad field of red and seemingly arbitrary spatial divisions, has been described as the visual crossroad between the principles of Concrete and Neo-Concrete art. Alfredo Volpi’s (1896–1988) work, considered to be a singular achievement in the evolution of geometric abstraction in Brazil, is represented in the Collection by works such as Concreto [Concrete] (c. 1950) and Bandeiras verdes sobre rosa [Green Flags on Pink] (c. 1957). Mira Schendel is another major Brazilian artist who produced highly intense works that use Concrete language to reveal the potential of what is invisible. Sem título [Untitled] (1954), one of her best-known early works, combines both painting and sculpture to create a highly poetic and enigmatic work that has elicited multiple interpretations since it first came to public attention.