José Pedro Croft

Born in Porto, José Pedro Croft (1957) lives and works in Lisbon. Graduated in Painting from the Escola Superior de Belas-Artes of Lisbon, 1976-1981, his learning in sculpture benefited from the collaboration in the studio of the artist João Cutileiro, where he experienced the cut with the sculptural tradition of the Estado Novo and assimilated the revaluation of materiality and the refusal of handcraft. Renowned since the 1980s as a central player in the updating of the sculptural field, Croft has also established himself in the areas of drawing and engraving. His initial career is marked by a series of collective exhibitions - Círculo de Artes Plásticas de Coimbra, 1981, Galeria Metrópole, 1983, Arquipélago SNBA, 1985 - which consolidate the emerging generation to which he belongs and where Cabrita Reis, Pedro Calapez, Rui Sanches, Rosa Carvalho, and Ana Léon are also to be found. 

Starting with stone work, mostly marble, Croft developed architectural compositions of funeral referent (Untitled, 1986, SEC), exploring the accumulation of overlapping elements. In the 90's, the juxtaposition of large cuboid shaped volumes of plaster and pieces of furniture stood out, contradicting the functionality of the objects (Untitled, 1995, CCGD), and since 1996 the notion of assembly has become more complex in structures where mirror planes appear (Untitled, 2001, MACAM). This research extends to the iron, glass and mirror devices that have characterized his production for the last decades. Activated in the relationship with the spectator and the space, these geometric objects still integrate primary colours. Using a reduced material lexicon - marble, iron, glass, mirror, or wood - José Pedro Croft regularly returns to everyday objects such as tables, chairs, or doors. Varying in complexity, his constructions deconstruct notions of balance, weight and density. 

Represented in national and international collections, his work has been the subject of important solo exhibitions, José Pedro Croft, FCG, 1994; José Pedro Croft 1979-2002 Retrospective: 2002; José Pedro Croft Gravuras, FCG, 2006, and Objectos Imediatos, Cordoaria Nacional, 2014-. In 1995 he joined the Portuguese representation of the Venice Biennale, received in 2001 the Tabaqueira National Prize for Public Art (Queluz), the EDP Prize - Drawing, and in 2007 the AICA Prize. 

 

RS, setembro 2020