Fábio Colaço is a young Portuguese artist who presents his first solo exhibition at ADN Galeria. In it, the visitor can observe a materialization of concerns from our daily lives, thanks especially to an exhibition route that fictionalizes the symbolic structure of a house. The result is a project that describes a dystopian reality, an intricate network of associations that reflect different readings of our time and of different historical episodes.

Colaço’s works open space for critical reflection and transcend the traditional limits of sculpture, his main area of artistic training. The pieces use alternative materials and devices, adapting each technique to different investigations. The works as a whole reveal a concentration of cultural references, especially linked to the history of art, which demonstrates their symbolic and iconographic power in the context of the contemporary cultural industry. Thus, the subversive nature of the works and also their irony create allegories that facilitate new interpretations by the viewer. In each title there is an analysis value of certain collective social nowadays traumas, where our economic system takes center stage. This is helped by the inclusion of pieces that use an element that integrates several of them as a raw material shaped by the artist: money.

As we have seen, in this exhibition apparently familiar and banal images and objects are appropriated, metamorphosed and recontextualised. In short, Colaço expresses a rebellion against museologically consecrated forms, challenging the way in which we perceive power. Yesterday, today, tomorrow is the opportunity to discover for the first time in Barcelona the pertinent and poignant work of an artist whose pieces are already recognized and that are part of several collections in Portugal.

(Text by Fábio Colaço and Paulo Mendes)