The origin of educational projects in the Art Biennials of São Paulo

Abstract

Education in the São Paulo Art Biennial took place because the visiting public and art critics founded that the I Biennial of the Museum of Modern Art in São Paulo, in 1951, had not organized an educational project to introduce modern art, especially the abstract one, to Brazilians. Walter Zanini was one of the critics who have highlighted this failure, which was also identified among the 10.000 students who visited the exhibit. As an immediate action, lectures and meetings were organized involving the exhibition organizers and commissioners who accompanied the countries delegations, called national representations. The model followed was the Venice Biennial of Art, forerunner of biennial exhibitions and referenced by the São Paulo Art Biennial. The first educational project of the Biennial featured monitors prepared in a course of art history at the São Paulo Museum of Modern Art, under the orientation of Professor Wolfgang Pfeiffer. The workers of industries and not the students justified this initiative, subsequently criticized by Mario Pedrosa.