“Apparent Innocence”, the first solo show by the artist from São Paulo Andrea Rocco at the gallery, opens on May 6th. About 70 drawings in small and two large format works in pastel compose the selection made by Andrea for the exhibition that began to gain shape after the artist revisited the work of the Portuguese painter Paula Rego.

Andrea, who is currently living in Portugal, came across a text from the Portuguese in which she says.” imagine that in a painting, instead of the figure in a place where it is well, it is placed in a place where it is wrong. The painting begins perversely wrong. Then you have to find a way to get it right. “This is the same aesthetic used by Andrea in this series, thorny and controversial themes such as the pseudo-hero’s mystification, the search for fame at any price, excess consumption and the continuity of a colonial enslaved thought, gain a “decorative background to match the sofa.”

The perversity of Andrea’s work is in the approach of these themes in a fanciful way, with scenarios out of fairy tales, with a palette in pastel tones and wrapped in decorative paraphernalia. The choice of the images and the use of the pastel were also not random. “I use traditional artistic material, but in bright colors papers, as if I wanted the information to arrive on a billboard that is not subtle, making a counterpoint to the pastel tones of the drawing,” says the artist.

Also, part of the exhibition is a showcase with drawings of stuffed birds that, although dead, remain beautiful. Each bird is named after an anesthetic drug, such as Xylocaine, Aftine, Lidial and are a reference to the times we are living in, all anesthetized in front of everything we see daily.