Cícero Dias retrospective at Simões de Assis Gallery spans 1920s-1960s works

A retrospective of seminal Brazilian artist Cícero Dias is on view at Simões de Assis Galeria de Arte in São Paulo. The exhibition, curated by gallerist and collector Waldir Simões de Assis, features 40 works including watercolors, paintings from 1920 to 1960, and lithographs from the Suite Pernambucana series. Simões de Assis, a personal friend of Dias for decades in Paris, notes the artist rarely dedicated himself to lithography, first doing so in 1933 to illustrate Gilberto Freyre's 'Casa Grande e Senzala.' Key works include the 1929 watercolor 'O Sonho Tropical,' the 1930 oil painting 'Coqueiral,' and the sexually charged 'Encontro no Canavial' from 1930. The show traces Dias's evolution from early figurative works to abstraction, as seen in 'Musicalidade' (1940) and the 'Entropia' series from the 1950s. Dias, born in 1907 in Engenho de Jundya near Recife, studied painting in Rio de Janeiro, first exhibited in 1927, and moved to Paris in 1937 where he befriended figures like Paul Éluard and Picasso. His monumental 1931 panel 'Eu vi o mundo… Ele começava no Recife,' shown at the Salão de 1931 in Rio, was criticized as erotic but cemented his career. Writer Mário de Andrade described Dias as possessing a surprising personality with sexuality, sarcasm, and mysticism as key psychological values. The exhibition runs until August 4, 2026.