5º Prêmio CNI SESI SENAI Marcantonio Vilaça

The CNI SESI SENAI Marcantonio Vilaça Award for Visual Arts, the most important art prize in Brazil, aims to create approximations, in a democratic way, between art, culture, and knowledge. All 30 finalists of its 5th edition participate in this exhibition at MAC USP– it’s the first time the Award presents a group show.

According to Marcus Lontra, curator of the award, “the prize aims to reinforce the importance of artistic research and experimental practices in new generations. The circulation of the exhibition of the prize in ten Brazilian cities determines the dimension of the project in its broad and national character”. The traveling exhibitions will also count with a deep educational project.

Virgínia Medeiros (b. 1973, Feira de Santana, Brazil), Berna Reale  (b. 1965, Belém, Brazil), Grupo EmpreZa  (Goiânia), Nicolás Robbio (b. 1975, Mar del Plata, Argentina) and Gê Orthof (b. 1959, Petrópolis, Brazil) were the five wining artist of the 5th CNI SESI SENAI Marcantonio Vilaça Award for Visual Arts; the two curators awarded were Divino Sobral (based in Goiânia) and Raphael Fonseca (based in Rio de Janeiro). Each artists received a R$ 40.000 award, and the curators a R$ 20.000 award each. Plus, artist Virgínia Medeiros and curator Raphael Fonseca were awarded residencies grants at the Manchester Metropolitan University, England.

The Marcantonio Vilaça Award for Visual Arts is an initiative of the National Confederation of Industry (CNI), the Social Service of Industry (SESI) and the National Service of Industrial Learning (SENAI). In its last four editions, the event awarded 20 artists with work grants to produce works that were exhibited in several locations in the country.