“From Nature we can accept with humility its laws and suggestions, always acknowledging it to be the greatest artist of all, with more to teach than one can learn.” - Roberto Burle Marx
Andrew Kreps Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of works by Roberto Burle Marx (b.1909, São Paulo, d, 1994, Rio de Janeiro.) A polymath, and pioneer of both Brazilian Modernism and ecological conservation, Burle Marx left a lasting impact on the public and private landscapes of Brazil. This exhibition, organized in collaboration with Almeida & Dale, is the first in New York devoted solely to his painting practice and spans five decades of his career.
Burle Marx spent his early life in Rio de Janeiro, and received his first formal artistic education following a move to Berlin in the late 1920s. Studying at the Degner Klemm School, his exposure to the European Avant-Garde, particularly the works of Picasso, Van Gogh, and German Expressionism, deeply influenced his early artistic practice. Simultaneously, an encounter with Brazilian species of plants, in the Dahlem Botanical gardens, provided a sharp contrast to the developed landscape of Brazil he encountered in his youth, which had been populated by non-native species. He would carry these influences back to Brazil, where he continued his education at National School of Fine Arts in Rio de Janeiro. Under the guidance of the painter Leo Putz, and Lúcio Costa, who would later become a frequent collaborator along with Oscar Niemeyer, Burle Marx shifted his studies from architecture to art, developing a unified approach across landscape design and art. His subsequent coming of age as a designer and artist in the 1930s was set against the backdrop of the Gétulio Vargas’ regime, which sought to project a new image of Brazilian modernity abroad, furthering his interest in shaping a national identity that was intertwined with the country’s indigenous flora.
For Burle Marx, painting and landscape design were interrelated languages, and by the 1950s, he had moved away from traditional modes of representation, towards abstraction. The sinuous, geometric forms that came to characterize his compositions find easy parallels in the biomorphic curves of planted beds, and the intricate plans for his gardens, often read as color studies in their own right. While at times, he described design as painting with plants, he also affirmed the integrity of each of his chosen media, stating, “this is what I am very attentive to: I do not want to make a painting that is a garden.” Guided by shared principles, but not formulas, Burle Marx saw his gardens as a way of expanding his work not only into three dimensions, but also, through time. His gardens wove in flowering species intended to bloom in different seasons, set against perennial foliage, activating public spaces with varying chromatic experiences, ultimately becoming living landscapes in their own right. Despite being static objects, this sense of dynamism extended to his paintings, as undulating fields of color shift from the foreground to the background, creating a depth of field within the image. While Burle Marx saw nature as the ultimate act of creation, he remained steadfast in his commitment in the generative potential of human intervention and artistic practice, as well as the urgent need for environmental preservation.
By the time of his death in 1994, Roberto Burle Marx had designed over 2,000 gardens in Brazil and abroad, identified over fifty species of plants, and exhibited his work internationally, including the exhibition Roberto Burle Marx: The Unnatural Art of the Garden, at MoMA, New York in 1991. Receiving his first public commission from the Ministry of Education and Health in Rio de Janeiro in 1938, he would establish his own firm, Burle Marx e Companhia in 1947, and continue to execute major public projects throughout his career, which include Ibirapuera Park, São Paulo,1954, Flamengo Park, Rio de Janeiro, completed in 1965, the Copacabana beachfront Promenade, completed in 1970, and a design for Biscayne Boulevard, Miami, first proposed in 1988 and completed posthumously. Burle Marx was included in three editions of the Venice Biennale (1950, 1968, and 1970,) as well as two editions of the São Paulo Bienal (1953 and 1959.) His work was first exhibited in the United States as part of Brazil Builds: Architecture, Landscape, and Design, at MoMA, New York, 1943. In 1952, Lina Bo Bardi designed an exhibition of his work at MASP, São Paulo, which was followed by a series of solo exhibitions throughout the United States, developed in collaboration between the Pan-American Union and the Smithsonian. Posthumous solo exhibitions of Burle Marx’s work include: Places of Being: The Burle Marx, Museu de Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro, 2024, Brazilian Modern, The Living Art of Robert Burle Marx, the New York Botanical Garden, 2019, Roberto Burle Marx: Brazilian Modernist, the Jewish Museum, New York, 2016, among others. His work is held in the permanent collections of Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, MASP, São Paulo,MoMA The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the New York Botanical Garden, New York, The Art Institute, Chicago, and The Jewish Museum, New York, among others.