Hugo Canoilas

,Wound‘

17. - 31.05.2013

    ,Ve.Sch‘, 2013
    Ink on linen, 470 x 950 x 300 cm
    (enlarge: click image)








    at the opening…
    (click for further images)









    ,Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill!‘, 2008-2013
    Clay, lacquer, fabric and wood, 160 x 160 x 80 cm

    (click for further images)





ein Interview von Ludwig Kittinger mit Hugo Canoilas:

    LK: I see, and what specifically….. What were some of
    these things?

    HC: Online. I’ve done a few things in the past were
    I used political propaganda, which I searched online
    in some archives but also with google. These advertisements
    are an extension of the previous work in both
    conceptual content and painting procedure – where
    painting is there to be used and abused.

    LK: One might find this approach quite different to
    some of your other work that i find, lets just call it
    poetical, with the integration of poetical/philosophical
    texts/quotes, which automatically raises a question of
    authorship ( reverse authorship ? ) and the question;
    how many hugos are there?

    HC: I don’t know. And I don’t really care about this.
    I mean by the end one cannot leave his port
    (Fernando Pessoa). I don’t work with a retrospect perspective,
    I rather take the previous work as a platform
    to jump to another place, try to develop something,
    mostly try to grew with the experience of it, being
    affected by the work, being a cannibal in the sense that
    I aim to be another, to live many lives within one life,
    to create a memory in the sense of Kierkegaard. Yes this
    is a good perspective… when Kierkegaard wrote
    *In vino veritas * the
    perspective on love is diverse through a family of
    characters he developed. Also we live in a moment
    where the input is at a maximum – a whole array of
    information; an unbearable multiplication of events
    (social, political and artistic) that make the idea of
    one perspective or line quite impossible. You know,
    you open several windows at your computer, there are
    far too many art events going on that makes this idea
    of chaos, from which painters work from. But I don’t
    want to organize that chaos…

    LK: TR Young shaped the term “ fractal facticity “;
    more than one thing can be true simultaneously
    depending on the perspective in relation to time and
    space……..don’t you think, even though it’s surely not
    your/ones obligation, that decoding chaos is a help for
    an analysis of culture?

    HC: It might help or facilitate, help to have some
    degree of visibility like a stone in a swamp where you
    can rest, sit, get a higher position and gain a perspective.
    But culture is that elastic structure that can hold
    the difference, that enlarges specially with the attempts
    to destroy it. So should we care about decoding,
    being self-reflexive or even tautological in our
    work? Of course there people who are dealing with
    the reflexive and the rational, others with the affirmative
    and the subjective, and in between there’s a whole
    range of people doing work that aiming or not (being
    part of a mainstream or producing counter culture)
    might become assimilated by culture. It doesn’t
    depend on us.

    LK: Whatever success may mean to one, from a global
    perspective we live in times where the capitalist state
    (general public) is in demise and private power
    concentration at its peak, many are trying to find alternatives
    to make a living, what would you say anarchy has
    got to offer?

    HC: Anarchy has nothing to offer because of the
    education level of people is very precarious. When I
    mean education I mean a sort of whole education,
    what is called the holistic formation of the self.
    So without a formation of the being into an independent
    state, anarchy will have nothing to offer and art will
    have nothing to offer (for the whole).

    LK: How would you describe the development of
    your work, a single piece lets say? It originates from a
    good idea? a bad idea? a notion?

    HC: I can’t describe a normal procedure since for me
    to make my work doesn’t come from a precise state of
    mind or a formula. It’s more something that happens
    and this could be forcing it by working and failing or
    just get a click. Usually the click – the good idea,
    functions more like a platform to jump to the unknown.
    I like to work without any good ideas in my
    mind, or a precise goal. I like to work without a sort
    of need that I could talk about. I’m really interested in
    digging my stomach, trying to deal with that something
    that is making me work – an interior and
    primordial impulse.










    Hugo Canoilas
    Born in Lisbon, 1977. Lives in Wien.
    Solo exhibitions
    2013
    Spirit of the air, Wiener Art foundation, hosted by Kunstuero, Vienna, AT.
    Magma, Workplace Gallery, Newcastle. U.K.
    2012
    Paradise Birds – 30th São Paulo Biennial – A iminência das poéticas, curated by Luiz Perez Oramas, Tobi Maier,
    André Severo and Isabela Villanueva ; Museum Casa do Bandeirante; São Paulo. BR. (catalogue)
    Hugo Canoilas, ABC Berlin, Galeria Collicaliggregi , IT. Berlin, DE.
    The isle of the dead, Quadrado Azul Gallery, Porto. PT.
    Spoken words and white walls, Quadrado Azul Gallery, Lisbon, PT.
    Group shows
    2012
    Are you still awake?, curated by Emília Tavares. MNAC – Chiado Museum, Lisbon. PT.
    Drawing quote, curated by Nick Oberthaler. Pigna Project Space, Rome. IT.
    Porta Nigra, curated by Mark Kremer . Gallery Hidde van Seggelen, London, UK (catalogue)
    Critical Alliances, organized by Marcus Proschek, Ekaterina Shapiro and Wolfgang Obermaier. HDLU – Croatian Artists Association, Zagreb.
    Strata, curated by Francesco Sttochi, Sammlung Lenikus, Vienna. AT.
    Infinit tasks, curated by Paulo Pires do Vale, Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon. PT (catalogue)
    Beyond History. curated by Nuno Faria at José de Guimarães International Art Center, Guimarães. PT. (catalogue)
    CCC _ Collecting Collections and Concepts , curated by Paulo Mendes, European Capital of Culture, ASA Factory, Guimarães, PT. (catalogue)