Bolsa de Arte e Design

present

Mameluca Studio

Tropicando Collection, 2015

What we present is just another vision of a

movement for rescuing the essence, self-love and

faith in the Brazilian people.

There is no true if you do not live it;

There is no cruelty if you do not feel it;

There is no love with no sublime;

There is no faith with no perseverance;

There is no design if there are no differences.

TROPICANDO

necessary.” According to tropicalists,

culture embodies the mechanics for

understanding, interpretation and

reformulation the way information is

broadcasted, and this was powered

by them through Carnival, Brazilian

northeastern music and street art,

thus reaching the large Brazilian

masses of people.

Oswald de Andrade in his Cannibalist

Manifesto (1928) stated,

“Cannibalism alone unites us” urging

other tropicalists to realize Brazil

as a country of mixing ethnicities

which included Indians, Africans and

Europeans, and that a moral liberation

in favour of the different was needed.

Information should reach all types of

people.

Tropicália was an analytical cultural

movement born in 1967 as a

creative option for political and social

manifestation. Tropicalists believed

that new existing policies in Brazil

(after 1964) only served to the

elitist culture. According to Martinez

Correa, “to express a new and

complex reality to reinvent forms

to capture this new reality was

Artistic creations and movements

occurring during Tropicália did elicit

the people by showing disparities,

mismatches and a large array of

materials. Images unfolded that

counteracted one to another and

powered tensions. Influenced by

American Pop Art and French Realism,

Tropicalism champions the use of

Brazilian elements to highlight the

national issue: green and yellow

psychedelism, advertising language

and means of mass communication.

“WHY NOT? Why do not see the

national identity of Brazil as an

open process under a continuous

development?”

Barriers and limitations were broken

in each word, each object. Everything

was designed to make the life better

and to show people that nothing

was definitive. Instead, a productive

questioning resulted therefrom “Why

limit possible experiences and produce

art in a preconceived manner?”.

Martinez: “Criticism exists only when

there’s History in progress”.

Inspired by Oswald de Andrade’s

Cannibalist Manifesto, Oiticica then

added that “Cannibalism would be the

defense we have against the foreign

rule”.

Under the belief that tropicalist

philosophy is a movement that will

never end, we now celebrate its

50th anniversary by creating a

collection in honor of one of the

greatest artistic manifestations in

Brazil. Thus, we went deep inside

this political and cultural movement in

order to translate its concepts into

objects that could incorporate the

philosophy of that time and be aligned

with experimental moves of designs

and Mameluca’s parameters.

“We do not profess abstracts thinking

but we communicate live thinking”

stated the tropicalists.

Tropicália employed an aesthetical

breakthrough as a revolutionary

formula as well as Mameluca goes

through the new approaches to design

the objects. Tropicália puts together

the experimentalism and criticism;

Mameluca uses the criticism as trial

laboratory.

Based on this period of History we

display musical furniture, objects that

vibrate, twist and bind; ideas that

awake the curiosity for challenging

questioning as Why?, Where?, How?

The introduction of electric guitar

in the Brazilian music, for example,

made us think about the visual effect

that the sound distortions would

produce in the people’s mind. Then,

we visually depicted the effect caused

by the wide array of overlapping

guitar cables resulted from the move.

As it is a sound inspiration, the object

is floating in the space, and we called

it Vertigem (Dizziness).

In 1967 during the 3rd Festival of

Brazilian Popular Music, Caetano

Veloso sang his song “Alegria,

Alegria” (“Joy, Joy”) which would

become the icon of Tropicalist

Movement. In a curbed manner,

wearing an orange turtleneck shirt

and bright eyes Caetano translated all

feelings overshadowed by the political

disruptions at the time. This is the

time portrayed in the object Iluminado

(Enlightened).

Cannibalist Manifesto, a seminal

document for tropicalist movement, is

portrayed in Antropófago (Cannibal)

bar. Eleven thousand thorns simulate

a type of cannibalism of the object,

the perception of forms is lost by the

fagocitose between the bar and the

objects inside it. The shape is inspired

by a blend of Brazilian flag and thinking balloons

used in comic books and graphic novels in the

1970s.

By the end of 1960s, peak of political crackdown

in the country, some people were accepted

while others struggled to survive with their own

thoughts. Os Mutantes (The Mutants – Brazilian

rock band) were one of the few that outlived

that harsh period of time and could uphold their

beliefs alive. They warmed the soul whenever

their thoughts pulsed the emotions

out. Our intention was to portray

the group brain through Portento

(Prodigy), a changing-mood table

that reacts to the sound perception

exactly as Os Mutantes’ mindset is

conveyed in their songs.

As a breath of fresh air to the object

concept in the arts, Hélio Oiticica

created the Bólides, boxes to be filled

with his memories, manifestations

and hidden desires. By joining them

to the Penetrable we developed

Transestruturas (Trans-structures),

a translucent chromatic scale object

that changes the visual perception

thus enabling several uses and

possible compositions.

Hélio Oiticica’s Parangolés inspired

the creation of a rocking chair Supra

(Supra). Fabrics, cloths, plastics

and other materials overlaid become

meaningful as per the viewer’s

experience. Its twist was magic and

exploded out the expressions hold

inside each one. It was the moment

the persons were in touch with

themselves. The twist expresses the

richness of this creation and offers

a counterpoint to Oiticica’s work. By

employing gentle materials, each work

overlaid is assigned a function in

order to cause an enjoyable reflective

experience.

Favela (slum) was a place of high

inspiration for tropicalists. It was a

place to search for the people’s root,

dreams and needs. From Mangueira

Hill, Hélio Oiticica explored the slums

architecture. From there on, in

1967, he featured Tropicália work

at the Museum of Modern Art of

Rio de Janeiro (MAM) over the New

Objectivity exhibition.

“The act of walking in the installation produces a feeling of stepping back

on the floor.” – Hélio Oiticica.

In the search of Brazilian soul as presented in this sentence we created

an installation set up by the visual disorganization. Our work Cafofo

(Cozy) encompasses the essence of Brazil’s natural richness. Randomly

displayed, four Bólides each one depicting one type of raw material

found in the Brazilian soil. Tree, rubber, metals and precious stones

are provided in powder which enables both an experience of visual and

sensorial perception.

In order to honor the Brazilian

mix of races we have digged into

the roots of our people since the

colonization times. The reality of our

racial history has hugely surprised

us. Nowadays, on the average, only

10% have Brazilian indian ancestry

to 30% of African ancestry and

60% of European ancestry. Based

on these data we created the lamp

Ninho (Nest) that shows this very

proportion in the Brazilian DNA

by merging materials from each

continent.

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