Once upon a time: visions of heaven and earth is a collective exhibition organized as a journey through time and space to reflect on the end of the world and the imagination of other worlds. The exhibition, which takes place in the Grande Galeria of the Pina Contemporânea building, articulates the perspectives of 33 artists from various generations and origins in Brazil and around the world, whose productions allow us to glimpse the confrontation between different logics of inhabiting the planet and, above all, inventing it; a journey through time and space to reflect on the end of the world and imagine new beginnings.

The exhibition investigates the cosmological thinking of artists, from 1969 – the year that marks the historic events of man's arrival on the Moon and the publication of the first UN report on Problems of the urban environment – to the present day, when humanity's predatory relationship with the planet has placed environmental issues as a central theme in debate around the globe.

In Once upon a time, artists make diagnoses and imagine other possible realities – mixing documentary, speculative and fictional approaches.

From heaven to Earth

The exhibition is divided into three parts. Upon entering the Grand Gallery, visitors walk through a series of works that look at outer space, in an attempt to understand and imagine what is beyond Earth. Works such as Yauti in heavens (Saturn, Moon landing and Moon arrival) (1988-9), by Regina Vater, My three inches comet (1973), by Iole de Freitas, among others, until they reached the work of Steve McQueen, Once upon a time (2002), which gives the exhibition its title. In 1977, NASA sent a series of photos into space, with the aim of sending records of life on the planet to extraterrestrials. McQueen presents 116 of these images, explaining a nostalgic narrative constructed by North American scientists, who gathered a finite selection of images that simulate life on Earth, without considering issues such as poverty, wars and religious conflicts.

In the gallery's central space, artists look down from the sky at a planet in dispute, while also thinking about ways to connect with Earth. Bovinoculture XXI (1969), by Humberto Espínola, the artist uses a giant cattle horn to address the ambivalences of agribusiness, which destroys the environment to generate wealth in an inconsequential manner.

Still in the same room, the relationship between artists and the planet is defined through ancestral and spiritual connections. Jota Mombaça, in the film The birth of Urana Remix (2020), lives the experience of burying the artist´s body in the earth, becoming part of the whole.

Imaginative speculation

With the rise of the Anthropocene (a term used to describe the global impact of human activities on the planet), artists invite us to conceive of new worlds, based on movements of resistance and radical imagination. In this part of the exhibition, artists such as Yhuri Cruz anchor themselves in imaginative speculation and take us to new universes, such as that of Revenge (2023)

Colombian artist Astrid González presents a free society in Drexciya (2023), a work that integrates videos, images, sculptures and drawings to create an underwater community descended from pregnant women who were thrown overboard on ships carrying enslaved people between 1525 and 1866.

Organized by Ana Maria Maia, Lorraine Mendes and Pollyana Quintella, the exhibition Once upon a time: visions of heaven and earth features a catalogue that brings together a collection of 19 selected texts, some written by members of the exhibition, such as Yhuri Cruz and Jota Mombaça. The catalogue includes essays, poetry, manifestos, transcribed oral reports, among others, articulating a mosaic of voices, practices and epistemologies and can be found in the Pinacoteca’s physical stores or online.

Participating artists: Anna Bella Geiger, Anna Maria Maiolino, Arthur Luiz Piza, Astrid Gonzalez, Bu'ú Kennedy, Carla Santana, Carlos Zilio, Carolina Caycedo, Castiel Vitorino Brasileiro, Celeida Tostes, Cipriano, Edival Ramosa, Erika Verzutti, Feral Atlas, Humberto Espindola, Iole de Freitas, Jaider Esbell, Janaina Wagner, Jota Mombaça, Juraci Dórea, Luciana Magno, Luiz Alphonsus, Mariana Rocha, Mayana Redin, Movement of People Affected by Dams (MAB), Mira Schendel, Patricia Dominguez, Regina Vater, Steve McQueen, Sueli Maxakali, Tabita Rezaire, Uýra Sodoma, Xadalu Tupã Jekupé and Yhuri Cruz.

(The exhibition is sponsored by Itaú Unibanco and Rede, in the Platinum quota)