“In your hands”

José Bechara began his painting studies in 1987 at the Escola de Artes Visuais (EAV) in Parque Lage. An artist who came after the so-called Generation 80, he abandoned the canvas and began to explore the process of metal oxidation, mainly on used truck tarps. His experimental research, which he continued in depth over the following decade, established the artist as one of the leading names of the Generation 90.

In 1992, he began experimenting with different media and techniques, and in the same year, he held his first solo exhibition in Rio de Janeiro. In his research in the pictorial field, Bechara explored truck tarps – used, marked and stained by goods, the road, and time. He did not use colored pigments or brushes (the materials used in so-called traditional painting), but “painted” through the process of oxidizing metals on the tarp.

In the 2000s, Bechara's work also took on sculptural qualities, in works such as "The House" (2002), in which furniture and objects from a residence jump out of the house's windows. Incorporated into the artist's visual repertoire, the form of the house (and its objects) appears in small-scale installations and sculptures throughout the 2000s ("Open House" series).

Among Bechara's major exhibitions are the 25th São Paulo Biennial, the 29th Panorama of Brazilian Art, the 5th Mercosul Biennial and the 2011 Lisbon Architecture Triennial, the 1st Bienalsur – Buenos Aires, the 7th Beijing International Art Biennial, Anozero'19 – 3rd Coimbra Biennial of Contemporary Art, the Bienalsur 2019 – National Museum of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and the exhibitions “Caminhos do Contemporâneo” and “Os 90” at Paço Imperial–RJ. He has held solo exhibitions at MAM Rio de Janeiro - BR, Instituto Tomie Ohtake - BR, Ludwig Museum (Koblenz)–DE, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation–PT; Es Baluard Museu d'Art Modern i Contemporani de Palma–ES; MAC Paraná–BR; MAM Bahia–BR; MAC Niterói–BR; ASU Art Museum–USA; Brazilian Sculpture Museum (MuBE)-BR, Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo–BR, among others. In 2017, the year he turned 60, the artist presented the solo exhibition "Fluxo Bruto" at MAM - RJ.

His works are part of public and private collections, such as the Museum of Modern Art of Rio de Janeiro-BR; Centre Pompidou-FR; Pinacoteca of the State of São Paulo–BR; Ludwig Museum (Koblenz)–DE; ASU Art Museum USA; Oscar Niemeyer Museum-BR; Es Baluard Museu d'Art Modern i Contemporani de Palma–ES; Gilberto Chateaubriand Collection/MAM RIO–BR; Dulce and João Carlos Figueiredo Ferraz Collection/Figueiredo Ferraz Institute–BR; João Sattamini Collection/MAC Niterói–BR; Itaú Cultural Institute–BR; MAM Bahia–BR; MAC Paraná–BR; Culturgest–PT; Benetton Foundation-IT/CAC Málaga-ES; MOLAA–USA; Ella Fontanal Cisneros–USA; Cândido Mendes University–BR; MARCO de Vigo–ES; Brasilea Stiftung–CH; BGA Fund–BR; the University of Coimbra - CAPC, Circle of Plastic Arts of Coimbra - Portugal; the National Library, in Rio de Janeiro - Brazil; Iberê Camargo Foundation - Engraving Studio of the Iberê Camargo Foundation, in Porto Alegre - Brazil, among others.