This text by Wilson Rocha discusses the retrospective of printmaker Henrique Oswald that took place in the context of the Primeira Bienal Nacional de Artes Plásticas held in the city of Salvador, state of Bahia, in 1966 and 1967. Rocha considers Oswald’s work authentic and praises his mastery of printmaking technique. He asserts that the artist’s production is tied to post-Impressionism, abstraction, and New Figuration. Rocha places emphasis on the use of the color gray and on the nuances in Oswald’s graphic work.

This text on the graphic production of Henrique [Carlos Bicalho] Oswald (1918–65) was published on the occasion of the Primeira Bienal Nacional de Artes Plásticas held in Salvador, the capital of the state of Bahia, in 1966 and 1967. That event recognized the importance of printmaking and dedicated two exhibition rooms (hors concours) to that technique. One of them featured work by artists based in Bahia in the forties, fifties, and sixties; the other housed a retrospective of the work of Henrique Oswald, a printmaker and professor at the Escola de Belas Artes da Universidade da Bahia in the fifties.

Only two editions of the Bienal Nacional de Artes Plásticas da Bahia were held. The event brought contemporary works by Brazilian artists from other parts of Brazil, largely São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, to Bahia. At this first edition, emphasis was placed on artists working in abstraction, as well as young artists close to the Pop and New Figuration movements. At the time, production of this sort clashed with local “modernist” production, which was still anchored in popular references and the region’s tradition. 

[For other texts by Rocha on this event, see in the ICAA digital archive his essay on painter “José Pancetti” (doc. no. 1110852)].