Many describe Lygia Clark as one of the most important Brazilian artists of the 20th century, tied with Tarsila do Amaral. But when she took her creations off the wall, she turned her back on the art world.
Among auction records and retrospectives in museums like MoMA, the muse of neo-concretism is still a global name. The exhibitions planned to celebrate her centenary, completed now, reflected this. They have been planned and organized by the Portuguese fair Arco Lisboa and by the headquarters of the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain, and in Venice, Italy. But they were suspended or postponed because of the coronavirus.
Despite this worldwide acclaim, it’s hard to believe that the artists ended her art career far from the art circuit, complaining of the flu that never passed, according to critic and curator Maria Alice Milliet.
More importantly, you may not know that, in her later years, Clark even renounced her own art. She declared herself a “non-artist” and started to dedicate herself to an experimental therapeutic practice that she developed.
Translated by Kiratiana Freelon