MASP’s Tarsila do Amaral Exhibition Attracts Museum’s Largest Audience in 20 Years

SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL – Tarsila do Amaral’s exhibition at the São Paulo Art Museum (MASP) had already received 350,000 visitors by last Sunday, July 21st. It is the largest audience at the museum in the past 20 years, and a phenomenon only comparable to the Monet exhibition in the 1990s, which was seen by 400,000 people.

On Tuesday, July 23rd, the day the museum provides free admission, the lines to enter the museum started outside at 6 AM, and the organization estimated a six-hour wait to enter the exhibition. By the end of the week, it is expected that 30,000 more people will view the display, called “Tarsila Popular”. The show runs until Sunday, July 28th.

The most controversial painting in the exhibition is Abaporu (1928), which belongs to MALBA (Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires), and had not been seen in São Paulo since 2008.

Tarsila was one of the leading figures in the first generation of the modernist anthropophagical movement. The aim was to reject the strong influence of European culture and create a nationalist art, featuring the colors and people of Brazil.