This is the report filed by the Meridional news agency about the attack on the paintings on display at the Exposição de Arte Moderna, the event sponsored in 1944 by the municipality of Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais. The report included statements from Brazilian artists and intellectuals who commented on the incident. The painter Lasar Segall, for example, said that those responsible were no different from those who used the term “degenerate art” to describe the works shown at the previous year’s retrospective at the Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, in Rio de Janeiro. In Segall’s opinion, those who claim to be opposed to modern art in Brazil are merely puppets of Adolf Hitler’s Propaganda Minister, Josef Goebbels, whose quote is used as the title of the article: “As soon as I hear people speak about culture, I take out my revolver.” Other Brazilian intellectuals—including the poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade, the movie critic Paulo Emilio Salles Gomes, the art critic Lourival Gomes Machado, and the artist Lívio Abramo—also spoke out against the attack, describing the destruction of works of art as a reactionary, fascist act.   

This article condemns the destruction of eight of the paintings on display at the Exposição de Arte Moderna, the exhibition organized in 1944 by the painter Alberto da Veiga Guignard (1896–1962) and the writer J. Guimarães Menegale (1898–1965), and presented at the Municipalidad de Belo Horizonte. The attack was carried out by a group who, according to the newspaper report, entered the space at night carrying posters with anti-modern art statements. They were mainly interested in targeting Mendigos, the painting by the artist Tomás Santa Rosa (1909–56). Carlos Drummond de Andrade, Paulo Emilio Salles Gomes, Lourival Gomes Machado, and Lívio Abramo denounced the attack as a “fascist” act. The exhibition, which was the brainchild of the mayor (and future president of Brazil, 1956–60) Juscelino Kubitschek, included 130 works by 46 artists. Its impact as one of the most influential modernist events in the country earned it the nickname “Semaninha da Arte Moderna.”    

While the exhibition was in progress, two caravans of artists and intellectuals from São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro made the trek to Belo Horizonte to attend a parallel series of conferences. Within the field of visual arts, the exhibition and conferences were an integral part of Kubitscheck’s plan to modernize the city. This grand plan included, among other initiatives, the opening of the Pampulha architectural complex (1943), and the founding of the Instituto de Belas Artes (the following year) with an inaugural speech given by the painter Alberto da Veiga Guignard, who was considered a key figure in the introduction of modern art in the state of Minas Gerais.     

In addition to Santa Rosa and Lasar Segall (1891–1957), the other artists whose works were shown at the exhibition were: Alfredo Volpi (1896–1988), Anita Malfatti (1889–1964), Roberto Burle Marx (1909–94), Candido Portinari (1903–62), Emiliano Di Cavalcanti (1897–1976), Djanira da Motta e Silva (1914–79), Tarsila do Amaral (1886–1973), Victor Brecheret (1894–1955), Iberê Camargo (1914–94), Milton da Costa (1915–88), Oswald de Andrade Filho (1914–72), José Moraes (1921–2003), and Hilda Campofiorito (1901–97).