Biography

Macaparana was born Jose de Souza Oliveira Filho in the state of Pernambuco in 1952. He started to draw at an early age: the boredom of a long convalescence allowed him to discover the pleasure of inventing worlds with the only help of a piece of paper and a bunch of colored pencils. Little Jose learned to develop his artistic skills in his father’s sewing workshop: fascinated by his colored chalks, his patterns, his rulers, his threads and needles, the boy played with pure forms

He experiments with the infinite possibilities that this potent mixture of geometry and color offers.This is the source of pieces of frozen music. Each work is unique, and at the same time, it is the counterpoint of another work. In his series, when we contemplate an isolated work, we have the feeling that we are seeing in a hollow version another work with which it holds a dialogue and rhymes, like a secret verse.

Macaparana flings himself into the unknown: he works without a previous plan, but his hand already intuits the contour of the adventure he will embark on. He draws; he cuts the cardboard; he questions the materials; he plays with colors. And in this way he gradually builds a small world that brings the hope of beauty to the existing one. Patiently, cut after cut, fold after fold, Macaparana creates joy.

His early production was figurative, but when he moved to Sao Paulo he came into contact with the artists of the Neo-Concrete movement. In that city he experienced a sort of second birth, and he acquired his new name. In 1979, Pietro Maria Bardi – founder and director of the Sao Paulo Museum of Art (MASP) – and artist Antonio Maluf, began to call him by the name of his hometown: Macaparana.

Since that time, he has participatd in dozens of exhibitions, art fairs and biennials. He was invited to participate in the Sao Paulo Biennial in 1991. He has shown several times at ARCO, Madrid. Among his latest exhibitions, special mention may be made of his participation in Art Basel, and his two 2010 solo shows, at Jorge Mara-La Ruche Gallery (Buenos Aires) and Dan Gallery (Sao Paulo), respectively.

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