How to Remain Silent
Exhibition 24 October–10 November 2017
Installation photograph from the ‘How to Remain Silent’ exhibition on A4’s ground floor. A computer with earphones sits on a table screening Jonathas de Andrade’s video work ‘O Caseiro’ (‘The Housekeeper’), accompanied by printed matter on the table and on a pin board behind it.
Installation view: How to Remain Silent curated by Juliana Caffé, October 24, 2017–November 10, 2017. Image courtesy of A4 Arts Foundation.
Title How to Remain Silent Dates 24 October–10 November 2017 Location Ground Floor Tagline An exhibition of video works and publications, curated and edited by Juliana Caffé.
Curator Juliana Caffé
Credits

Editor:
Juliana Caffé

Design and production:
francis burger

Translation:
Gabriel Blum

Partner:
Centre for Curating the Archive (UCT)

"Art and politics are profoundly entwined practices; they meet and intermingle constantly in the arena of social life. Part of the power of artistic creation resides in its ability to suggest new ways of experiencing the world, of creating new spaces and temporalities and of summoning the senses into asking questions, formulating problems and offering solutions that might change or chip away at personal habits and social conventions. This political side of art, which can broaden the way the world is comprehended as well as change it, makes its importance felt at times of crisis. This is also why art from a given period in history can account for that period itself.

How to remain silent? is the rhetorical question that remains whenever one considers discussing Brazil today. How can one ignore the successive political, ethical, economic and cultural scandals on the news each day? How can one not be bothered by the fact that chaos has become the new normal? Comprising videos and one publication, the exhibition features work by contemporary Brazilian artists who have somehow engaged this question and used their art to protest, question or encourage new ways of existing and living in society. Whereas the publication addresses the political, social and artistic events of the last five years and works its way up from the June 2013 demonstrations, the curated videos cover a longer time frame; but they address questions that are still pressing in Brazilian society."
- Juliana Caffé

How to Remain Silent includes contributions from Ailton Krenak, Berna Reale, Clara Ianni, Daniel Lima, Frente 3 de Fevereiro, Gian Spina, Graziela Kunsch, Jaime Lauriano, Jonathas de Andrade, Lia Chaia, Luiz de Abreu, Raphael Escobar, Renata de Bonis, Roberto Winter, Rodrigo Braga, Sato do Brasil, Traplev, Virginia de Medeiros, Julián Fuks, Paulo Fehlauer, Peter Pál Pelbart, and #artepelademocracia. 

The screening of Zumbi Somos Nós by Frente 3 de Fevereiro accompanies a conversation with Daniel Lima & Amílcar Patel on October 31, 2017.

Process image from the ‘How to Remain Silent’ exhibition on A4’s ground floor that consists of a screenshot from Zoom conversation between Daniel Lima & Amílcar Patel.
Process: How to Remain Silent curated by Juliana Caffé, October 24, 2017–November 10, 2017.
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Process image from the ‘How to Remain Silent’ exhibition on A4’s ground floor that consists of a still frame from Lia Chaia’s video performance ‘Aleph’. At the front, a closeup view of an arm with a glass orb balancing on it. At the back, an out of focus view of São Paulo cityscape.
Process image from the ‘How to Remain Silent’ exhibition on A4’s ground floor that consists of a monochrome still frame from the video recording of Ailton Krenak’s speech ‘Defense of the People’s Amendment of the Union of Indigenous Nations’ at the 1987 National Constituent Assembly in Brazil.
Process image from the ‘How to Remain Silent’ exhibition on A4’s ground floor that consists of a still frame from Lia Chaia’s video performance ‘Minhocão’, showing Chaia regurgitating images of buildings.
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