“Tunga” [Antonio José de Barros Carvalho e Mello Mourão] (1952–2016) was a major contemporary Brazilian artist who started his career in the late 1960s. In the 1970s he had two exhibitions at the MAM-RJ (Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro, 1974 and 1975); his most recent one was at the Museum’s Sala Experimental. Created by FUNARTE [Fundação Nacional da Arte], the Espaço ABC was active in the early 1980s, when it was responsible for organizing memorable exhibitions of experimental Brazilian art. It contributed to a historic, more consistent reading of the works of a variety of artists, including Antonio Manuel, Tunga, Milton Machado, and Carlos Zílio. The Espaço established a relationship with the Coleção ABC (Arte Brasileira Contemporânea, also part of FUNARTE), which published slim volumes on the works of the most important Brazilian artists of the period, such as: Antonio Dias, Lygia Clark, Lygia Pape, Carlos Vergara, Rubens Gerchman, Artur Barrio, Cildo Meireles, and Anna Bella Geiger, among others. Wilson Coutinho was a distinguished critic in the late twentieth century, from 1980 to 2003.
[For more on Tunga, see the following articles in the ICAA digital archive: by Wilson Countinho et al. “Os obscuros objetos do prazer” (doc. no. 1111081); and by Magno M. D. “Tunga: os outros nomes do zero ou as metonímias do um” (doc. no. 1110603)].