Brígida Baltar

Brígida Baltar created art across a diverse array of mediums, including video, performance, installation, drawing, and sculpture.

Brígida Baltar's Art Style

Baltar's artistic journey began in the 1990s with small poetic gestures developed in her studio-home in Botafogo, a neighborhood in Rio de Janeiro. For nearly a decade, she collected elements of domestic life, such as water dripping through small cracks in her roof and dust falling from her brick walls. This act of collecting eventually expanded into the outside world, leading to the Coletas series, where she attempted to capture mist, dew, and the ocean breeze—an ultimately intangible task. During this time, she also created a variety of works using collected brick dust, including landscape drawings on paper, ornate compositions on walls or floors, and sculptures. 

Brígida Baltar often rooted her process in fabulation, blending and embodying human and animal characteristics to redefine our relationship with nature. This approach is notably visible in works such as "Ghost Crab," "Bee House," and "Voar."

In her later work with ceramics, she explored the relationship between body and shelter, a central theme in her oeuvre, creating sea shell shapes that merge with human forms. In her final years, she focused on embroidery, producing works related to her body and skin. This reaffirmed her lifelong ability to use personal experience to address philosophical concepts and sensations.

Exhibitions of Brígida Baltar's Works

Baltar's work was exhibited in institutions across Brazil, as well as in the United States, Japan, Argentina, and other countries. Her solo exhibitions include "Brígida Baltar (1959-2021): To Make the World a Shelter" at Nara Roesler in New York (2023), "Brígida Baltar: Filmes" at Espaço Cultural BNDES in Rio de Janeiro (2019), "A carne do mar" at Nara Roesler in São Paulo (2018), and many more.

She participated in significant biennials, including the I Biennial of the Americas in Denver, USA (2010); the 25th Bienal Internacional de São Paulo (2002); the V Bienal de la Habana (1994); and the 12th Bienal do Mercosul (2020).

Baltar's works have been featured in group exhibitions held at various prestigious venues worldwide, including Museu da Imagem e do Som (MIS) in São Paulo, Sesc Copacabana in Rio de Janeiro, Fundação Joaquim Nabuco in Recife, Centre d'arts et de Cultures in Grenoble, Galería Casas Riegner in Bogotá, among others.