Elizabeth Jobim's trajectory within the field of visual arts spans around four decades; his first participation in an exhibition was in 1982, in Rio de Janeiro. When we look at works from different moments of her research, two elements seem constant: painting and its relationships with the human body.
Regarding the way her works tend to be read from the perspective of abstraction, I prefer to think of this association more in terms of the blink of an eye than the monogamous relationship; Paying attention to her journey, it is notable that part of her research begins with the imitation of reality and transforms into compositions that can be interpreted more openly by the public. Her works are sometimes found in dialogue with very precise images – I remember, for example, the drawings and paintings that dialogue with Giambologna's sculpture representing the Rape of the Sabine Women or, even better, the images in which he responds to the Laocoön sculptural group. All of these works are from the 1980s and bring, each in its own way, something that seems to me to be present with different degrees of subtlety in the artist's gaze: an interest in the physicality and movement of the human body with its anti-classical contours full of veins, wrinkles and kinks.
As Paulo Sergio Duarte noted in an essay about her work[1], if in paintings prior to these series we notice her interest in gestures and color of the so-called “80s Generation”[2], when we analyze works from later decades we again notice her attentive observation from around the world – tubes of paint and Portuguese stones were starting points to experiment with different scales, colors and textures. When this explicitly figurative data leaves the scene, the artist highlights the sensorial appeal of her compositions – mismatches between different canvas sizes, direct responses to the architecture of the rooms where she exhibited, games between different depths within the same painting object and even spatial occupations which are caused by the accumulation of small paintings. In recent years, Beth has taken painting off the walls and brought it to the center, both in formats similar to boxes/totems, and also in conversations with those stones that she has observed so much.
When I see the works gathered in this solo exhibition by the artist, I think that, in truth, she continues this experimentation given by the equation between painting and body. Here, oil paintings are still present, but in smaller numbers. In them we are invited to notice not only the gaps between colors, but also the moments in which a cut is chosen in the structure of the canvas that causes the same composition to be divided by more than one module. Inviting us to pay attention to the details, the artist suggests the difference between the white that separates the colors painted by her hands and that line that is also inserted into the image, but which occurs through a cut in the material.
For the first time, Elizabeth brings to the public eye a large series of works made directly with fabric; the material had already been experimented with in some recent objects, but here we see them on a large scale. Linen is the chosen material and the colors, as in his paintings, tend towards a more earthy and sober tone. These colors make up stripes and polygonal shapes that appeal to the viewer’s senses – not just due to their clever contrasts, but their materiality. We are faced with paintings that feel slightly soft to our bodies and, like any fabric, immediately seem to invite us to touch.
There is a presence in this series that speaks through the lens of difference with the artist's usual use of the roller in her paintings: sewing stitches. When observing the details of these surfaces, we notice discreet junctions that allow different colors to form part of the same stripe, but also for, at other times, linen to embrace wood or oil on canvas. This might be an interesting way to observe these works: long hugs between colors that involve objects through the fabric. This leads us to another important fact that matches the nature of the material: as with any fabric, no matter how much effort there is to stretch it and simulate its planarity, we can always notice its warp and small wrinkles on its surface. This is a matter that invites another management of the notion of control; It is important to respect the elasticity and temporality of linen, this fabric made for thousands of years from the plant of the same name.
“Between times” contrasts with the fleetingness of the terrible news that incessantly invades our bodies and invites us to a slower speed in enjoying this meeting of works. In a present so full of tragedies, this exhibition by Beth Jobim – like much of her research – is a nod to the subtleties that persist in the world.
The desire remains that, very soon, we can be reconnected with that necessary slowdown not only to fold and weave fabrics, but also to observe the contours of Laocoön and the surfaces around us.
[1] DUARTE, Paulo Sérgio. “Pintura plena” in Elizabeth Jobim. São Paulo: Cosac Naify, 2015, pages. 9-51.
[2] It is important to remember that the artist participated in the famous exhibition “How are you, 80s Generation?”, in 1984, at the Escola de Artes Visuais do Parque Lage, in Rio de Janeiro, and curated by Marcus Lontra, Paulo Roberto Leal and Sandra Magger.
