CURRICULUM

Sylvio Flores

"I was born in a historic city located in the mountains near Rio de Janeiro. When I was a boy I nurtured my dream of studying in France, and ever since I was 14-years-old I've been a painter. In 1962, at the age of 21, I finally went to study at the Academie de La Grande Chaumiere in Paris, and in the following year I enrolled at the Ecole Nationale Superieure de Beaux Arts. This experience was decisive in my formation. Besides being influenced by the work of modern art masters like Paul Klee and Mondrian, I learned diverse techniques such as sculpture and etching in metal.

"The eight years that I lived in Paris initiated the artistic path which I still follow today: abstraction in oils on canvas. I primarily explore textures and experiment with original materials in order to create different visual effects.

"I was happy to be in Paris and London during the 1960s, a decade of open revolution in terms of sexual culture and customs. I returned to Brazil at the beginning of the 1970s and was greatly shocked by the violent dictatorship that ruled the country. I decided to establish myself in a hacienda far from the conflict and today I live in a beautiful place where I set up my workshop of painting and ceramics.

"After all these years my work has been characterized by a great volume of themes – the volume increased in such a form that I ended up making sculptures as well. I work with stoneware ceramic fired at 1,380º C in a process inverse to that of geology: transforming clay into stone. I use a Japanese wood-burning oven known as a noborigama, which has been dated as far back as 2000 B.C. It is like executing alchemy; the fire is a live element and the glazes made from ash suffer varied interruptions during the firing process, resulting in surprising effects. I create my own glazes, always searching for the point of equilibrium between liquidity and thickness."

Sylvio Flores has participated in important exhibitions throughout France and in Rio de Janeiro.