Sloterdijk recalls that at the entrance to Plato's Academy the following warning was engraved: “Let no one ignorant of geometry enter”. In spite of it seeming arrogant and harsh, this phrase might be understood as a subliminal invitation to reflect on what expertise or aptitude that individual might possess—either someone with prior knowledge in the spatial branch of mathematics, or someone with the curiosity, intelligence, and capacity of studying and grasping the meanings of pure forms. The presence of a second phrase is also known: “Those not open to love affairs will not be welcome in the garden of theorists”. This phrase underscoring the belief fact that those who are distracted from the immanence of Eros would not be able to understand the history of form as a romance.
Monumental Negative-A Family Portrait invokes geometry, through the affective elements valued by Plato. For this it started from a numerical arbitrariness, determined by the members of the Haudenschild family and their heights. Measures were taken and raised depressions or elevations in the soil were excavated or constructed so that all the relatives could be of the same stature. By a happy coincidence, the matriarch of the family is the only one to be at ground level. The members were arranged in alphabetical order as a means of blending the generations—a monument to the dissolution of the hierarchies, the presences, absences, and the natural misalignment that time provides.
About Cadu
Cadu lives and works in Rio de Janeiro. He was the invited artist at the 30th Sao Paulo Biennial, the 13th Istanbul Biennial, the Festival of Europalia and the 7th Mercosur Biennial. He has had individual exhibitions at the Wu Gallery in Lima and Vera Cortes Art Agency in Lisbon (2012), as well as in the Casa de Cultura Laura Alvin in Rio de Janeiro and in the Vermelho Gallery in Sao Paulo (2011). His work is focused on processes that change coding systems to generate images/sensations. Many of his pieces demonstrate the way in which time and action produce visual markers that help orient us.
