Tag: Abílio-José Santos

Born in Maia, Abílio-José Santos (1926-1992) was a poet and designer. He attended the Machinery and Electrical Engineering course at the Porto Industrial Institute.

The work of Abílio-José Santos is marked by an incessant search for new media and renewed materials and learning along the path of a permanent politicization of aesthetics, with the insurrection against all established powers occupying a central place. The profusion of manifestos he wrote is one of the most visible aspects of this, and these missives – in the form of verses, text, collages or other graphic manipulations – are aimed at personalities with institutional power, such as renowned critics linked to the art market; or they can be addressed to figures whose prominence is based on symbolic capital, such as some well-known authors of Portuguese and Brazilian literature. But more than addressing these specific individuals and institutions, the exercise of a radically critical poetic justice that is present in Abílio’s works imposes itself as a corrosive implosion of established discourses on art, politics and society. His poetic work is marked by intersignic experimentation using a wide range of techniques and materials, including collage, photo-montage, drawing and photocopying. His appropriation of previously existing material sources – such as press clippings or, especially, poor materials that could be considered mere debris – fits in perfectly with the continuous subversion of discourses that we find in Abílio’s poetics. The author himself reflects on this proposal to intervene by “recycling”, repurposing and reusing the spoils of society when, in one of his manifestos, he summarizes his position in the motto “art as trash / trash as art”.The use of different materials in his work gives the materiality of writing new expressiveness. His work in the field of visual poetry and mail art is as pioneering as it is radical. Although he is represented in the main anthologies of experimental poetry, his poetry was rarely published. Author of manifestos and pamphlet texts.

Main works > O voo do morcego (1962), Lidança (linóleos de Maria Augusta, 1968), Carta a Vinícius (1969), Carta ao crítico d’arte rui mário gonçalves (1969), Despertador (1974), (COLAGE)Manifesto vermelho (1976), Reza ao dólar (1982), Dia de pica boi (1983), O futuro defunto que se parece comigo (1983), Poéticas visuais (1985), Trabalho/liberdade (1987), Fotocirurgiando (1987), Manifestos LIXARTE (1987), Corporis Christi (1991), T’arrenego (1991), O futuro defunto que se parece comigo (1991), Interrogações (1991), Gente da poesis (1991), Escrita (1992), O Equilibrista (1991), Diálogos im/previstos (1991), V(l)er (s.d.).

[Biography written by Bruno Ministro; translation by Rui Torres]