Tactile Trace of Time and Solidarity: Final Day Excitement for “Hand in Hand” Exhibition at Exmouth Market!
On London’s art route before this autumn, a very special and time-sensitive farewell excitement is taking place that shouldn’t be missed. Bringing together the forces of two original Brazilian artists, Thiago Barbalho and Lidia Lisbôa, the “Hand in Hand” exhibition is preparing to say goodbye to its audience with its final day taking place tomorrow at the gallery in Exmouth Market. Taking its name and philosophy from Brazilian poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade’s unforgettable 1940 poem Mãos Dadas, this selection sets escapism aside to focus on the urgency of the present, social solidarity, and the transformative power of the human hand. Curated by Maria do Carmo M. P. de Pontes, the exhibition envelops every corner of the space both physically and poetically with intertwined hands and a sense of shared production.
Poet and artist Thiago Barbalho, in his site-specific mural spanning the gallery space, paints negative spaces in a vibrant yellow, leaving white hand silhouettes on the wall; thus blurring the boundaries between interior and exterior, foreground and background with striking visuality. While Barbalho’s forearm sculptures with intertwined fingers symbolize deep love and solidarity among different communities, hand figures also play the leading role in his massive drawings that bring together various materials ranging from oil paint to acrylic, colored pencil to resin. The artist’s wavy “dune” drawings entering into dialogue with Lisbôa’s aesthetics seamlessly complete the rhythm and fluidity within the space.
Lidia Lisbôa, who forms the other half of the exhibition, presents to the audience the fruits of her artist residency conducted in the gallery’s studio over the past two months. Reinterpreting her famous “termite mounds” series by shaping the texture of raw materials such as terracotta and white clay sourced in London with her own fingerprints, Lisbôa also elevates her weaving and textile practice to a breathtaking dimension. Hanging from the ceiling in the most intense shade of red, the artist’s giant crocheted sculpture from her Teats that Fed the World series adds a deep layer to themes of motherhood, nourishment, and vulnerability with a nod to Louise Bourgeois’s famous Maman spider sculptures. Her monochrome drawings, produced through the repetition of chain-like patterns, conceptually bridge sculpting and weaving processes.
Raised outside traditional art education and the metropolises considered centers of contemporary art, these two talented artists whose paths crossed in São Paulo establish an unforgettable dialogue honoring manual labor, co-production, and “the present time.” For all art lovers wishing to catch this captivating exhibition—whose materials are time and whose space is human touch—at the last moment and personally experience the sense of unity in creative action, it is of great importance not to miss this gathering opening its doors for the last time tomorrow.
