Tarsila do Amaral. Abaporu. 1928

Tarsila do Amaral. A Cuca, 1924

Tarsila do Amaral. Carnival in Madureira. 1924

I went to Tarsila do Amaral: Inventing Modern Art in Brazil at MOMA. It was just as MOMA explained “a rare opportunity to explore the work of this daring modernist” for me. I felt Tarsila’s works were charming and they made me relaxed. Although she had professional education as an artist, her works look more like Naïve art than Modernism or Cubism art.

Tarsila do Amaral (1886–1973) is an Brazilian artist. She studied in Paris with André Lhote, Albert Gleizes, and Fernand Léger. The exhibition focuses on her pivotal production from the 1920s, when she navigated the art worlds of both São Paulo and Paris, and charts her involvement with an increasingly international artistic community, as well as her critical role in the emergence of modernism in Brazil.