Waldemar Cordeiro senses the emergence of a new strain of figuration on the basis of a group of works exhibited at the VII São Paulo Biennial (1963), the last edition of the event held before the military coup. Cordeiro is convinced that modern art now finds itself in “a pragmatic state” in terms of communication and consumerism, ushering in a “semantic period” akin to sociopolitical events. Both Informalism and anti-art objects, he argues, formulated an efficacious criticism of “the beautiful form.” Crucial aspects of new figuration like the random and the active role of the viewer entail an important step towards total reality. The “thing” (object), which is a means of alienation, comes to be the work of art, which, pursuant to transformation through information, becomes a component of montage. At stake, then, is industrial production, the landscape created by the mediating technique of modern man. The insertion of the object itself as opposed to its representation is, in Cordeiro’s view, capable of producing extreme realism. 

In the sixties, after having played an essential role in the Concrete movement that emerged in São Paulo in the fifties—specifically through the “manifesto ruptura” which he wrote, along with a group of colleagues, in 1952 (see ICAA digital archive doc. no. 771349)—Waldemar Cordeiro (1925-1973) reformulated his perspective pursuant to the emergence of Pop art and the Nouveaux Réalistes. The artist was interested in New Figuration, a movement central to the work a number of countries sent to the VII São Paulo Biennial (1963). Cordeiro’s approach to New Figuration, however, was informed by the concept of semantic Concrete art. Essays by Cordeiro on this topic include “Arte concreta semântica” (doc no. 1110835) and “Max Bense : carta-prefácio” (doc. no. 1110838). In the sixties, the artist produced his Popcretos series that, unlike the readymade, entailed a re-contextualized appropriation of everyday objects like doors, tables, and axes. In this text, Cordeiro demonstrates both his interest in a new reading of the object and his belief in the importance of “appropriation” as long as it is not isolated; that is, provided it participates in the montage of objects as innovative artistic proposals. 

The combative painter, designer, landscape artist, and art critic Waldemar Cordeiro came to Brazil from his native Rome after World War II. Starting in the late forties, he wrote for the Brazilian press. The text “O objeto” (doc. no. 1086891) is paradigmatic of the ideas he defended during that time of intense clashes in the sphere of art in Brazil. On the basis of the self-referential nature of the idea of “the Concrete”—conception of art as a real and absolutely autonomous object—Cordeiro triggered a wide range of discussions and debates with artists and critics of the time, among them poet, journalist, and art critic [José Ribamar] Ferreira Gullar (b. 1930) who defended the subjective facet of art. Ferreira Gullar’s “Teoria do não-objeto” (doc. no. 1091374) was pertinent to what would later become the Rio de Janeiro-based Neo-Concrete movement.