Gretta Sarfaty
Gretta Sarfaty is a painter, photographer, and multimedia artist who earned international acclaim in the 1970s for her artistic works related to body art and feminism. Born in Greece, in 1947, she moved with her family to São Paulo in 1954, being naturalized as Brazilian.
Alongside her art she was the founder of the artist-run space, Sartorial Contemporary Art, and since 2010 she keeps an art collection called Alegre Sarfaty Collection.
From the 1970s on, Gretta developed her artistic career. She took fine arts classes in São Paulo, at FAAP and the Escola Pan Americana de Artes - she was taught by artists working also in São Paulo, including Walter Lewy, Ivald Granato, Mário Gruber, and Savério Castellano. She studied photography with the photographer Julio Abe Wakahara during 1975. Due to her artistic work and exhibitions, she moved to Paris, Milan and New York.
Gretta exhibited her work at institutions such as Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo, Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo, Museu de Arte de São Paulo, Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, Moreira Salles Institute,, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Museo MACRO Asilo, Palazzo dei Diamanti di Ferrara, Foundation Calouste Gulbenkian, Fundação Vera Chaves Barcellos, Centre Georges Pompidou, Internationaal Cultureel Centrum, New York University, among others.
Personal life
Gretta was born in Athens in 1947 and was named Alegre Sarfaty, from parents of Italian, Greek and Turkish origin. In 1954, her family moved to São Paulo, Brazil.At the age of 17 she married José Grzywacz; she has three children from this marriage: Victoria Sarfaty Grzywacz, Pedro Grzywacz and Rafaela Grzywacz Goodman.
Nowadays, the artist is established in São Paulo,Brazil, spending some brief periods of the year between New York, London and Italy.
Artistic career
Throughout her career Gretta exhibited mainly in São Paulo, New York and London. In the 70s she participated in numerous solo shows in Brazil displaying her early paintings. Her world travels and mixed background has had an important influence on her more contemporary visual work – particularly her photography and collages which deal in themes of identity and culture, although her art is not restricted just to the canvas. Marchant's work embraces a wide range of media including installation, photography, video, paintings, and performance.Brazil and Europe
At the beginning of the 1970s she started creating the series of paintings, Metamorphosis and her work was noted by the Brazilian gallerist, Franco Terranova. In 1975 he participated in the . In 1976 he showed her works in the Galeria de Arte Global, in São Paulo. In 1979 she had several shows in Germany and in Italy and also in Paris, Centre Georges Pompidou, where she performed the Evocative Recollections. In 1980 she held the exhibition Evocative Recollections & Transformations at the Museu de Arte Contemporânea. In 1983 she created a series of paintings with a book, dedicated to the Brazilian culture, Self-Portrait of Brazil, a publication containing a series of paintings by the artist and texts about important personalities from the country that was exhibited at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo (MASP) and in 2011 participated in the exhibition Arte como Registro, Registro como Arte, na Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo.''Auto-Photos''
This series of photos from 1976 is one of the first Marchant's artworks dedicated to female identity and its various demonstrations: her face appears in sequences of beauty and ugliness, grace and madness. A frivolous play with recurrent images of herself is in fact an ironic dialogue with the constructed cultural image of a woman. Marchant expresses in this series the notion of gender performativity, a term created by Judith Butler in 1988.Roberto Pontual wrote about this work:
The work of Gretta has been originally more related to the language of photography, especially during her recent stay in Europe. Her main focus has always been the female body, including her own body as a symbol of women's condition in our society.
''Transformations''
Here the topic of deconstructing the female image gains even more strength. Marchant's face is being manipulated and distorted:Rather than the manifestation of personal destructive tendencies, these images should be viewed as the externalisation of a revolt directed against the male cultural stereotype, mortifying as it does the feminine form into the authoritarian and distorting dimension of an abstract and aesthetic beauty, to which the artist opposes the angry vision of a reverse side, through a body that is deformed, disfigured and fragmented.
''A Women's Diary''
Another work from 1976 where Marchant uses photography to create a diary of her own body, captured in almost abstract poses. The way that the body appears on the photos calls into question its materiality.''Evocative Recollections''
In 1979 she performed Evocative Recollections in Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, as well as in Palazzo dei Diamanti di Ferrara, Italy. This performance was then shown in different locations in Belgium, Brazil and Italy. Under the same title, Evocative Recollections, Marchant continued the topic of female body and women's liberation in the series of photos. In an essay published for Marchant's solo exhibition at the Centro Culturale La Filanda Gillo Dorfles wrote about this series:Sure: such pictures will not be the same with another artist, with another option, however, even considered under a point of view of photographic document, Gretta's corporeal options reach an unusual efficacy. We are in front of a little common combination, between the creative activity of an artist who knows how to enjoy the expressive dynamic and plastic possibilities of her body and the realisation of a photographic documentation which remains autonomous as well as in its technical as in its aesthetic values.
New York
In 1983 Marchant moved to New York and after a traumatic event, the fire in the Hotel Chelsea, she began a collaboration with American video and multimedia artists. She also started to discover Kabbalah esoteric thought: she became friends with Simon Jacobson and Kenny Vance and she decided to picture the Kabbalah community in her paintings. She also created a performance, ' and a video, '.By the time she was represented by the New York-based gallery, Foster Goldstrom Fine Arts, she was involved in the artistic and cultural life of the city and she got to know Arthur Penn, with whom she collaborated in 1993 on his film The .
Some important exhibitions held in New York were Body Works at the Foster Goldstrom Gallery in 1983. The same year he participated in the Body Works & Evocative Recollections at the Keith Green Gallery. In 1984 he had his work exhibited at the inauguration of the Trump Tower.
''Body Works''
In the late 80s and early 90s Marchant created a photographic series of Body Works, where naked bodies constitute a denunciation of the hedonistic and alienating practices to which the female form is submitted, a denunciation of the repression and mystification to which women's education exposes them from every direction. And they are an affirmation of the real sensuality of women, which respectability nonetheless still attempts to hide or to repress. And so, like gallery owner Romana Loda, we can quote Hugo Von Hofmannsthal when he said: "The profound should be hidden. Where? On the surface".''Gretta & Becheroni: Change and Appropriation of an Autonomous Identity''
Video made in 1980 in collaboration with Elvio Becheroni. Marchant perform in a cube made of paper ribbons, making herself a passage through the space. It is a metaphoric way to the new identity. This work evidences the prison of the woman in the society through its voyeuristic aspect, evoking a ritual of liberation. This work was exhibited in the Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo and in other countries like Argentina, Italy and the USA. .''Goya Time''
Inter-disciplinary multimedia event with 100 artists, curated by Marchant, Sandro Dernini, and Butch Morris. Marchant wrote a script and directed this art opera inspired by Francisco de Goya's artworks. The performance took place in 1985, in "Quando", church and a car park at the Lower East Side, New York.''Virtual Body Works'' 1988/2013
During the spring of 1987, Marchant was invited to participate in an interactive telecommunications event, Who Killed Heinrich Hertz?, created by InterComm. She became involved in collaborative work with each of the above video artist. In 1988 Ira Schneider created a video dedicated to Marchant.''Myth''
Video produced by Denny Daniel, in 2003. It is a compilation of snapshots of Marchant, manipulated with a kaleidoscopic effect and juxtaposed with scenes from Marchant's everyday life. The structure of the movie remains the style of music videos from the late 80s.London
In 1995 she moved to London and married Richard Marchant, "the leading Oriental ceramics dealer". She continued creating photography related to questions of femininity and identity and was represented for the gallery Wolseley Fine Arts. From 2005, he founded his own artist-run gallery, Sartorial Contemporary Arts, a gallery designed to promote exhibitions of young artists as well as his own.''Reflections of a Woman''
Woman as a central artistic subject appears not only in her auto-portraits but also in the series of paintings dedicated to an issue of female identity and body, Reflections of a Woman. It was exhibited in the, London, in 1997.In this series of paintings Gretta is talking not only about herself, but also about other women. She has found a way to represent women's nature. It is not her body any more, but every woman's body. They can still be self-portraits, but they also are portraits of the women of today, full of confidence about their own identity and conscious of their power.
''Myth of Womanhood, 2001-2005''
The title itself is a provocative statement by the artist in relation to the Female versus Feminism issue, and how the use and abuse of that subject has now become a cliché. The series consists of one photographic image which is duplicated several times to form a stimulating kaleidoscopic final picture. The Myth of Womanhood marks Gretta's return to performance art, however in this instance the performance is only for the camera.''Youth Versus Gravity, 2001-2005''
In this series, Gretta manipulated mirrors and their reflections to have a complete view of the subject from different angles. Separate images were used to create fun compositions through symmetry, which are intended to transport the viewer back to the illusion of childhood. In Youth Versus Gravity, the artist has been guided by issues related to longevity.''Permutations, 2009''
The installation is a cosmological ricochet which is conceptualized through repeated images of bananas, self portraits and geometric exegesis in ordered sequences in front of a symbol of the Shield of David. Here Gretta is interested in synchronicity and meaningful coincidences.Recent activity
In 2005 she opened her own gallery, Sartorial Contemporary Art. In October 2008 this moved to a larger space in Kings Cross. Marchant has curated several of its shows including Notting Heaven, Mothers, Remember My Name, Burning Candy, Obsession and Water. Along with Jasper Joffe and Harry Pye she has been a co-editor of The Rebel magazine.In 2010 she has exhibited in the show Bad Girls, together with Marina Abramović, Annette Messager, Orlan and Gina Pane. The concept of the exhibition was to compare four generation of female artists since the 70s. In 2011 her works were shown in an exhibition at the Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo Arte como registro, registro como arte, documenting the history of art performance in Brazil. The show highlights Marchant as one of the few Brazilian artists to ever exhibited at the Centre Georges Pompidou. One year later she participated in Foto/Gráfica – a New History of the Latin-American Photobook, at Le Bal, Paris and Libriste – Dalla collezione di libri d'artista di Marco Carminati: Gretta Sarfaty & Elvio Becheroni. Modificazione e appropriamento di una identita autonoma at the Instituzione Biblioteca Classense in Ravenna, Italy. In 2013 she had works exhibited in the show curated by Amir Brito Cadôr at the Museu de Arte da Pampulha in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. In 2015 participated in the exhibition, Ferrara, Italy.
In 2018 the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo celebrated its 70th anniversary in partnership with the Museu de Arte Contemporânea in which Gretta's work Auto-Photos were exhibited. This same year she opened his solo exhibition "Reconciliation" at Galeria Pilar in São Paulo.
The exhibition at in São Paulo represents the first individual of the artist in Brazil after the period when she lived out of the country, dividing her work between New York and London. "Reconciliation" brings a new series of works where the body, an outstanding element of Safarty's artistic career, returns to the painting, video art, engraving and photograph presents at the exhibition. This same body who stared the more known works from the artist, presents itself in the intimate and familiar context of the reunion.
In 2019, Gretta starts to be represented by, opening the exhibition "Dos nossos espaços vazios internos˜, which brings together vintage works, produced between the years 1970 and 1980, from the series Body Works, Metamorphic Recollections and Diário de uma mulher. In December 2019, Gretta opened the exhibition Reconciliações at the, a project contemplated by the Cultural Incentive Law - Lei Rouanet. Gretta also participated in the group exhibition "Estratégias do Feminino" at, the show brings together about 95 works by 53 female artists, produced between the beginning of the 20th century and up to the present day.
Also in 2019, Gretta started to be represented by an international gallery,, located in Porto, Portugal. In 2020, Gretta will participate in a solo exhibition at the gallery, scheduled to take place in May.
Exhibitions
Selected solo exhibitions
- 2019 - Reconciliações - IAB - Instituto dos Arquitetos do Brasil, São Paulo, Brasil.
- 2019 - Dos nossos espaços vazios internos - Central Galeria, São Paulo, Brasil.
- 2018 - Reconciliação - Galeria Pilar, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 2013 - Familia Memorabilis, Wedding Pictures and Sartorial Giveaway of a Lifetime!. Marchant's project led-space, Kings Cross, London
- 2010 - Through a Glass Darkly. Film by Gordon Beswick, Sartorial Contemporary Art, London
- 2009 - Gretta's Permutations. The show features "Gretta's Progress" by Gordon Beswick, a half-hour documentary about Gretta's life since the 80s, London
- 2008 - Gretta's Progress at Leeds College of Art & Design. Curated by Harry Pye and Olly Beck, Leeds, UK
- 2006 - X-RAY at the Perseverance, London
- 2003 - Life Works – 473 Broadway Gallery, New York, US
- 2002 - Myth of Womanhood & Youth versus Gravity Sartorial Contemporary Art. Curated by Julia Weiner, Head of Education at the Courtauld Institute of Art, London
- 1999 - The World of Horseracing The National Horseracing Museum of Newmarket, UK
- 1999 - The World of Horseracing Wolseley Fine Artes, london, UK
- 1997 - Reflections of a Woman, Wolseley Fine Arts, London.
- 1994 – ', Washington, US.
- 1993 - Body Works – exhibited in Foster Goldstrom Gallery, New York and also in Jansen-Perez Gallery, Los Angeles and San Antonio, Texas.
- 1988 - ' – Museu da Imagem e do Som e Paço das Artes,. Marchant's retrospective of 15 years of works comprising paintings, videos, performances, lectures and works in collaboration with Timothy Binkley, George Chaikin, Ira Schneider, Willoughby Sharp and others. Sponsored by the Brazilian Government. Curated by Marchant and Willoughby Sharp, São Paulo
- 1983 - Evocative Recollections - Galeria A. Niemeyer, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 1983 - – Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 1981 - Evocative Recollections - Galleria Multimedia, Brescia, Italia and Centro de Arte Euro-Americano, Caracas, Venezuela and Galeria Singular, Porto Alegre, Brazil and Galeria B14, Sttutgart, Germany.
- 1980 - Evocative Recollections and Transformations - International Cultureel Centrum - Antwerp, Belgium and Museu de Arte Contemporânea, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 1980 - Evocative Recollections - Galleria La Filanda, Veranno, Brianza, Italy and Galeria de Arte Parnaso - Brasilia, Brazil.
- 1980 - Gretta Sarfaty y La Autoimagen - Centro de Arte y Comunicación, Buenos Aires
- 1980 - Transformations - Galleria Arte Verso, Genova, Italy and Galeria A, Niemeyer, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 1979 - Evocative Recollections, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France and Palazzo dei Diamanti di Ferrara, Italy
- 1979 - Transformations - Galleria Diagramma, Milano, Italy and Galeria Papala, Karlsruhe, Germany and Galeria Andre Sigaud, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 1978 - Transformations - Galeria Bonfiglioli, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 1976 - Metamorphosis - Curated by Franco Terranova, Galeria de Arte Global, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 1974 - Metamorphosis - Petite Galerie, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 1973 - Metamorphosis - Galeria Documenta, São Paulo, Brazil.
Selected group exhibitions
- 2019 - Estratégias do feminino - Farol Santander Porto Alegre, Brasil
- 2018 - MAM 70: MAM e MAC exhibition of the 70th anniversary of the Museum in partnership with MAC/USP, MAM, São Paulo, Brazil
- 2018 - Plexus International Metr'Art – Museum MACRO Asilo, Rome, Italy
- 2018 - Apropriações, Variações e Neopalimpsestos - Fundação Vera Chaves Barcellos - Viamão, Porto Alegre
- 2016 - Exploring Spatial Environments by Women Artists in the 1960s and 1970s - Centro de Arte Moderna - Fundação Calouste Gulbekian, Lisboa, Portugal.
- 2015 - . Ferrara, Italy
- 2015 – ', Sala dos Pomares, Viamão, Brazil.
- 2013 - Fotolivros Latino-Americanos. Curadoria de Horacio Hernandez. Instituto Moreira Salles, São Paulo e Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
- 2013 - '. Curadoria de Amir Brito Cadôr no Museu de Arte da Pampulha, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
- 2013 - Fronteiras Incertas: Arte e Fotografia no Acervo do MAC USP – Museu de Arte Contemporânea MAC USP Ibirapuera, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 2012 - '; Gretta & Becheroni: modificazione e appropriamento di un'identita' autonoma. Istituzione Biblioteca Classense, Ravenna, Italy
- 2012 - Gretta Auto-Photos – Le Bal, Paris
- 2011 - ' – Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, Brazil
- 2011 - Performative, Jake and Dinos Chapman, Nicola Ruben Montini and Marchant, Sartorial Contemporary Art, London
- 2010 - ', along with Marina Abramović, Annette Messager, Orlan and Gina Pane, which were compared four generation of female artists, Italy
- 2008 - Again and Again, Marchant and Mister Solo, East London College of Art, London
- 2006 - Black History Month, Lewisham Library. Curated by Harry Pye, London
- 2006 - Half Life, Fieldgate Gallery, London
- 2005 - People Like Us, Nomoregrey Gallery, London
- 2005 - Bodynobody, curated by Luciano Inga Pin and Giuseppe Savoca, Milan
- 2005 - The Oh House & The Night on Earth, The Oxford House, Curated by Harry Pye, London
- 2000 - Arte Conceitual e Conceitualismos: anos 70 no acervo do MAC/USP - Galeria de Arte do Sesi, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 1989 –, New York, US.
- 1989 –, New York, US.
- 1988 – ', Gallery of Fine Arts of China, Beijing, China.
- 1987 - Art in Mind, La Viande Gallery, London
- 1987 - Summer Solstice '87, Art Performance 'The Marriage,' Marchant and Willoughby Sharp in WNYC-TV special by Charlie Morrow with: John Cage, Melissa Fenley, Philip Glass, Butch Morris, NY
- 1985 - , at C.U.A.N.D.O., organised by Willoughby Sharp Studio, Plexus & Sandro Dernini, New York
- 1981 - International Triennal of Drawings, Warsaw, Poland
- 1980 - Espaces Libres, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France
- 1977 -, Große Orangerie Schloss Charlottenburg, Berlim, Alemanha.
- 1977 - Poéticas Visuais. São Paulo, Brasil.
- 1977 - 9° Panorama de Arte Atual Brasileira. Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brasil.
- 1976 - 8° Panorama de Arte Atual Brasileira. Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brasil.
- 1976 -, Fundação Bienal de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.
- 1976 - 10º Arte e Pensamento Ecológico, São Paulo, Brasil.
- 1975 - - São Paulo, Brazil
Curating art
Marchant curated almost all exhibitions organised in the Sartorial Contemporary Art gallery, which she run for eight years.In 2009 she was a judge for the competition, Presenting the Top 100, organised in partnership with PRS for Music and Jealous Gallery, London.
Other shows curated by Marchant have included:Fortless Sartorial, an Interactive Performance Installation by Jeni Snell and Group exhibition with Panick's workshops, Corams Fields Youth Resource Centre and South Camden Youth Access Point. Sponsored by the Arts Council, O2 and Camden Council, London, 2009 – Leeds College of Art and Design, Leeds, 2008It Takes Two: James Jessop versus Harry Pye, Fish Market at South Market, London, 2007Europa Franca & Bahia in Museu da Imagem e do Som and Museu Paco des Artes Marchant's 15 years of work, exhibition sponsored by the Brazilian Government, in 1988La Maja in Goya Time, Art Opera Multi-Media Event, New York, 1985