As artistic director of the sixth biennial, Mário Pedrosa presents his general idea about the exhibition, commenting on the practice started in the second biennial (1953−54) to hold exhibitions “with a historical and curatorial stamp.” As this had become the custom, the biennials could now compete for importance in the field of “contemporary artwork" shown in what was called the Festival Internacional de Arte. Pedrosa noted the significance of going from nineteen countries in the first effort to the fifty countries from all continents represented in the sixth São Paulo event. The writer believed it would turn out to be the “most universal art exhibition in the world.” One factor supporting this claim was first-time participation of an African contingent represented at the “festival” that year, 1961.

In the triumphal climate of the inauguration of the new capital, Brasília, the Sixth São Paulo Biennial came to be known for its highly historical or “museographist” nature, to use a term dear to the heart of Mário Pedrosa. Pedrosa was always looking for the chance to attribute an educational value to the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo (MAM-SP) and consequently to the various earlier biennials, all under the guidance of the MAM-SP. Beyond the achievements of the biennial known as the “balanced biennial,” the great exhibition organized by Pedrosa in 1961 was the swan song of the entire initial period. As of the seventh round in 1963, the exhibition would no longer be organized by the MAM-SP and would be handled from then on by the Fundação Bienal de São Paulo, an independent institution created by the patron Francisco Matarazzo Sobrinho. 

Undoubtedly, Mário Pedrosa (1900−81), the intellectual and political figure, was the most influential theoretician and critic of Brazilian art in the twentieth century. Early on, he was international affairs editor for the Diário da Noite, and starting in the 1920s, he became a member of the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB). In 1932, he was imprisoned for his political militancy (as a Trotskyite). During the “Estado Novo” of Getúlio Vargas, Pedrosa lived in exile in France and New York, returning to Brazil only after World War II, as a contributor to Correio da Manhã. His anti-Stalinism led him to found the weekly magazine Vanguarda Socialista. He submitted a thesis in teaching aesthetics entitled “Da natureza afetiva da forma na obra de arte” (1949) at the School of Architecture (Rio), in which he set forth all his knowledge of philosophy and Gestalt therapy. During that same period, he was one of the founders of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA, 1948) and organized the Congresso Internacional de Críticos de Arte (Brasília, 1959). Pedrosa wrote the art criticism column in the Tribuna da Imprensa (1950−54), and during that same decade, he was an organizing member of the Second and Third São Paulo Biennials (1953 and 1955). He went on to serve as director of the MAM-SP (1961−63). He was secretary of the Conselho Nacional de Cultura under the brief administration of Jânio Quadros. During the military dictatorship, Pedrosa took refuge in Chile and became director of the Museo de la Solidaridad in Santiago; after Pinochet’s coup d’état (1973), he left for Havana and there served as secretary of the Museo de la Resistencia Salvador Allende. He returned to Brazil in 1977 (in the early days of the amnesty), and he was the first to sign the manifesto to create the Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) in 1980. Today, the immense library (8,000 volumes) assembled by Mário Pedrosa is partially accessible in the Biblioteca Nacional de Rio de Janeiro.

Regarding the reorganization of the São Paulo event, there is a text written by Pietro Maria Bardi “Como é e como deveria ser a Bienal” [doc. no. 1111147], and also a text written by Lourival Gomes Machado in 1951, “Apresentação” [doc. no. 1110834], introducing the curatorial standards of the first biennial.