Exhibition Details
A Head Full of Planets explores the context in which Santos Reinbolt’s artistic practice crystallized in the early 1950s, after she became a live-in cook for the architect Lota de Macedo Soares and her partner, the American poet Elizabeth Bishop, at their home in Petrópolis, a mountain getaway favored by Brazilian high society.
There, Santos Reinbolt painted in her spare time, rendering scenes with expressive brushstrokes in oil on paper and canvas. It was not until the mid-1960s, while working in another household, that she began to dedicate herself to embroidery and would begin creating many of the works for which she is best known today.
There, Santos Reinbolt painted in her spare time, rendering scenes with expressive brushstrokes in oil on paper and canvas. It was not until the mid-1960s, while working in another household, that she began to dedicate herself to embroidery and would begin creating many of the works for which she is best known today.
Additional Details
Featuring 42 densely-composed paintings and intricate embroideries representing scenes of pastoral life, urban landscapes as well as human, celestial and ornamental figures, this exhibition is the first comprehensive survey of Santos Reinbolt’s art ever presented and marks the first-ever solo museum exhibition for the artist organized outside her native Brazil.
Location
American Folk Art Museum
2 Lincoln Square
New York, NY 10023
Image: Detail from Madalena Santos Reinbolt, Untitled, 1965–1976. Acrylic wool on burlap, 35 7/8 x 46 in. Collection Renan Quevedo, São Paulo, Brazil / courtesy of American Folk Art Museum