Biography of Beatriz Milhazes
Internationally acclaimed Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhazes (b. 1960) is famous for her vividly colored and patterned abstract works: Elaborate kaleidoscopic compositions carefully balancing order and chaos, rational and irrational, controlled and spontaneous. Brazilian and European influences ranging from music, art, architecture and craft pulsate through her art, giving it the iconic sense of energy which vigourously draws us in.
Beatriz Milhazes’ works take as their starting point the print-making technique of painting an image onto a plate, and then transferring it to paper or canvas. In Milhazes’ process, the images are transferred sometimes perfectly, and at others revealing tears and holes which contribute to the complex surface of the final artwork. These imperfections reveal the importance of process as well as the role of chance in her practice. Milhazes often superimposes layers upon layers of images onto her works, creating a mass of collaged patterns and images.
Amongst the abstract forms are suggestions of lacework, beading and knitting, traditionally female crafts to which Beatriz Milhazes pays her respects. Femininity is always present in her explosive artworks – an important touch, especially given the military and authoritarian society she grew up in.
Beatriz Milhazes represented Brazil at the Venice Biennale in 2003. She has had solo exhibitions at the Perez Museum in Miami, the MALBA Foundation in Buenos Aires, the Fondation Beyeler in Basel and the Pinacoteca of São Paulo amongst others. Her work is in important institutions across the globe, such as the Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the MoMA in the USA, the Reina Sofia in Spain, and the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art in Japan.
