Exhibitions
15 years transforming everyday life into a monument by Flávio Cerqueira
To mark his 15-year career, São Paulo-born sculptor Flávio Cerqueira presents his first solo exhibition in Rio de Janeiro, featuring more than 40 bronze works, including three previously unseen pieces. The exhibition, which concludes its national tour of CCBB venues—having already welcomed over 200,000 visitors—is curated by Lilia Schwarcz. "Flávio Cerqueira: A Sculptor of Meaning" will be on view until January 8 at the Banco do Brasil Cultural Center in Rio de Janeiro.
The exhibition invites the public to contemplate and reflect on themes such as identity, race, class, and affection through sculptures that elevate the everyday to the status of a monument. Among the highlights is The Garden of Utopias , a landscaped space created in collaboration with landscape architect Lula Câncio, offering a poetic respite in the heart of the city.
Flávio Cerqueira (São Paulo, Brazil, 1983) works with traditional bronze sculpture techniques. A graduate in Fine Arts from the Faculdade Paulista de Artes, he holds a Master of Arts degree from UNESP, where he is also pursuing his doctorate and teaching sculpture. His work explores the construction of narratives through the human figure, addressing fundamental issues of class, identity, and race. Cerqueira seeks to capture fleeting moments and fragments of action, incorporating the viewer as a co-creator in the generation of meaning within the work.
His sculptures depict fictional characters in everyday, universal, and relatable situations: moments of introspection, reflection, concentration, and action. The presence of common objects—mirrors, books, tree trunks, ramps, stairs—creates a tension with the bronze human figures. This friction between the artwork and the space of the white cube reflects the artist's intention to blur the boundaries between sculpture and the world, as well as between the artwork and the viewer.
