For some time now, Tatiana Blass’ painting has sought more defined forms and more stable relationships between its elements. Since 2001, the artist has expanded her range of colors and come to organize them in a more regular manner. The blocks of paint were enclosed into well-defined masses, organized geometrically, with a simplified visual vocabulary. The forms appear to be dissociated from each other and operate within the painting as autonomous objects.
They do not establish solidarity or intimacy with their fellow guests. They have no objects or common ideals either. Nor, in general, do their colours resemble each other. They are well-defined and do not seek tonal relationships. They present unsuspected cuts and unfamiliar tones. When the blotches approach each other, they establish notable contrasts. The forms appear to see their neighbours as complete unknowns who have met for the first time in this canvas. But this is not a reason for them to create conflicts.
The artist is delicate and tries to settle these differences. But it is difficult to ruffle these pastes of paint. It seems that they have just left the factory, and have artificial colors, even kitsch ones at times. This is even more accentuated in the collages. The prints seem like formica, notebook covers and wallpaper. In some works, they imitate a cloudless sky and veins of wood. Everything in a continuous pattern that comes hot off the press. We thus have the impression they would accept any kind of tidying up, but this appears to be insufficient for Tatiana.
The artist does not devote herself merely to the tame ordering of the forms in a neutral space. Nor does the objective treatment of them appear to interest her. While these materials are hardly craftsmanlike and do not carry signals of expressiveness, they are far from Minimalist serialization and even the planning of Concretism. In the opposite sense to this objectivity of forms, Tatiana appears to seek a new way of constructing intimacy. In this way, her gesture does not change our relationship with nature, indeed, it seems to lie far from it. At the same time, she makes use of ready and finished materials and denatures their conventional function.
They remain regular, ready and smooth. They could be used in the most discreet way possible. But the artist has discovered their ambiguity, and despite the fact that at times, the forms of paint are projected in front of the screen, their cuts suggest volume within the canvas. These construct landscapes and cut out recognizable images on the paper. Indeed, with a degree of intimace that the scale of the works request. And it is no longer possible to bend nature, which appears as if it were another world, far away. Tatiana tries to give the things of the world another destiny.
Milan, Italy
Porto Alegre, Brazil
Porto Alegre, Brazil
Porto, Portugal
Minas Gerais, Brazil
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Cambridge, MA, USA
São Paulo, Brazil