“(…) words contain in their bodies many reassembled oralities” Manoel de Barros
Written by Rafaela Tasca
For this first Augmented Circuit – Collections in Circulation, Espaço Cultural BRDE – Palacete dos Leões and Museu Paranaense developed a plurality of initiatives aiming to augment the understanding of the erva-mate heritage. Amongst these, we have the exhibition Erva-mate Narratives and Poetics, inserted in the context of symbolic and territorial representations of the Palacete Leão Jr., former residence of Maria Clara and Agostinho Ermelino de Leão Jr. (both erva-mate entrepreneurs). The exhibition was developed by an interdisciplinary team and consists of a set of objects from institutional collections, reflecting the visual aspects associated with the erva-mate, as well as works that expand its representations and potentialities.
From the erva-mate ancestral cartography, the effects of the botanical classification by French botanist Auguste de Saint-Hilaire – made in 1820 – were presented: the congonha exsiccata, collectedin South America, crossed the oceans to enter the scientific code as Ilex paraguariensis. The international fairs were also one of the paths taken by the mate from Paraná. These iconic events from the end of the 19th century propagated the advent of modernity, such as printing techniques like lithography, which would become the narrative matrix for erva-mate labels. In these “erva-mate graphic expressions”, imaginaries were reproduced in mythological rearrangements using medals and commendations, seen amongst green fields and westerns and pinup figurations.
Still in the “hinge of centuries”, the landscape of the newly emancipated Paraná is expressed in the paintings of Alfredo Andersen – a Norwegian artist with the soul of a landscape artist, reminded here in a chamber exhibition. The great room, where the former bedrooms once were, is crossed by the General View of Curitiba, in a proposition of environmental scale of the celebrated panoramic photo painting of 1904, also colored by Andersen. Finally, in the tower room, artist Eliane Prolik installs the trans-historical site specific The Green is the Green – “a green that can be smelled, that materializes in the air”, as described by the curator Adolfo Montejo Navas.
A different Alfredo once told us that “starting with words may not be in vain”. Thus, Erva-mate Narratives and Poetics evokes for this Palacete the sum and the plural, avoiding an unique and vertical narrative, making an atmosphere resonate on the horizon for augmented experiences and poetics.
ABOUT THE PROGRAM:
The program Augmented Circuit – Collections in Circulation is a cooperation initiative between cultural institutions, created by the Espaço Cultural BRDE – Palacete dos Leões and Museu Paranaense. The program aims to amplify the perceptions of the mate heritage from the historical, anthropological, artistic and cultural perspective. Among other projects, the program includes the exhibition Eu Memória, Eu Floresta: História Oculta (I Memory, I Forest: Hidden History) a Museu Paranaense.