Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhazes fills the Vienna State Opera with color

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Pink Sunshine is the title of the mural decorating the curtain’s 173 meters that separate the stage from the auditorium during intermissions or when there is no performance.

Beatriz Milhazes is the first Latin American artist chosen to be part of the Museum in Progress project, an art association that through an international jury has been selecting a different artist to decorate the security curtain since 1998.

Unable to attend the presentation yesterday, the artist sent a message confessing that music is one of her passions and that the Vienna State Opera is a ‘magical place’ for her.

The jury emphasized that the work of Milhazes, born in Rio de Janeiro in 1960, combines the influences of artists such as Henri Matisse and Piet Mondrian, the Brazilian school of Neo-Concretism, folklore and folk art.

Landscape, botanical elements and geometric and architectural forms blend in a work that evokes and opens a door from the Opera stage into Brazilian culture.

Brazil’s ambassador to Vienna José Antônio Marcondes de Carvalho said that presenting this work is the best way to begin the celebration in Vienna of Brazil’s 200th independence anniversary, which will take place next year.

“It is also a recognition of the growing international prominence of Brazilian visual arts, with artists becoming better known. They are deservedly gaining more space in the international market, participating in important art exhibitions and other events,” the diplomat pointed out.

During the presentation of the design, which will decorate the fire curtain until the end of the opera season next June, Brazilian dancer Sinthia Liz performed a choreography inspired by Milhazes’ work.