Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel is proud to present “Antonio Tarsis: recipe for disaster”, the first solo exhibition by Antonio Tarsis (Salvador, 1995) since the announcement of his representation. Tarsis gathers such as matchboxes, pieces of cardboard, coal and paint cans in a daily practice that functions as an exercise in comprehending himself and the surrounding landscape. His work involves collage and superimposition of these objects, chosen by the artist for their formal attributes as well as for the sociohistorical associations they carry. At the intersection of these two formal and social axes embedded in the art object, he elaborates his oeuvre’s critical content.

The present exhibition gathers a selection of new works that provide a wide-ranging expression and development of the artist’s practice, with large and medium format collages, assemblages and drawings. Tarsis collects fruit boxes from different parts of the world, which he later deconstructs and recomposes with other elements, in compositions that register the geographical circuit of product packaging. The recombination of these fragments leads to a pictorial surface inscribed with disparate rhythms, interlocking textures and chromatic juxtapositions. The show also features a group of works made from matchboxes, employed as constructive parts of formal arrangements. The delicate nature of his material vocabulary, from wrapping paper to coal and the aforementioned matchboxes, is in stark contrast with the graphic expanses of his compositions, which sometimes verge on landscapes, sometimes on décollage. With matter in constant transformation, these works process transitional objects, relodged in new environments of meaning.

The exhibition is accompanied by a critical essay from researcher and curator Thiago de Paula Souza.

Among his noteworthy solo exhibitions are The End Begins at the Leaf — Anderson Borba & Antonio Tarsis, BeAdvisors Art, London, UK (2021) Symbolic Genocide, Carlos/Ishikawa, London, UK (2021); Colored Export, SET studios, Dalston Lane, London, UK (2019) e Maremagma, Luiz F.L Art Gallery, Salvador, Brasil. He ha salso participated in the group shows Flávio de Carvalho Experimental, SESC Pompeia, São Paulo, Brasil (2022); The Vibration of Things, The Fellbach Triennial, Fellbach, Alemanha (2022); Carolina Maria de Jesus, Um Brasil para os brasileiros, IMS – Instituto Moreira Salles, São Paulo, Brasil (2021); Engraved into the body, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York, USA (2021); Footnotes and headlines, Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York, USA (2021); Antifascismo Tropical, Queen Adelaide, Londres, UK (2019); Ecos do Atlântico Sul, Pivô, São Paulo, Brasil (2019); Imóvel, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil (2019) e Afrofuturismo, Caixa Preta, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil (2018).