Provenance:
Swiss private property, acquired at Art Basel, Basel;
Swiss private property, by descent to the present owners.

Literature:
Exhibition catalogue. Helena Almeida. Galerie im Taxispalais / Galerie des Landes Tirol, Innsbruck 2003, full-page illustration of another copy, page 2;
Exhibition catalogue. Helena Almeida: My Work is My Body, My Body is My Work, Serralves Museu de Arte Contemporanea, Porto 2016, full-page illustration from another copy, page 76-79;
Exhibition catalogue. Helena Almeida. Centro Galego de Arte Contemporánea, Santiago de Compostela 2000, Illustration of another copy, page 59.

The Portuguese artist Helena Almeida (1934–2018) creates conceptual photographic and performance art in which she places her own body in relation to the image. She explores questions of identity, visibility and boundaries – particularly from a female perspective. In doing so, she works with staged photographs, often in series, and combines painting, the body and space into a pared-back, precise visual language.

In Helena Almeida’s oeuvre, the 1976 series “Tela habitada” (Inhabited Canvas) represents a key work that laid the foundation for her subsequent creative period and whose theme the artist continually revisits in later works.
In a restrained yet precise manner, she addresses the fragile relationship between female presence and pictorial space. The series, comprising 16 photographs, each depicts an “image” – a stretcher frame covered with an empty, translucent piece of fabric instead of a traditional canvas. From the second photograph onwards, the artist becomes visible behind this surface. In a sequence reminiscent of a film clip, a minimal movement unfolds: The artist appears to be attempting to break through the foreground of the image. However, this attempt remains unfinished – the movement reverses, and she withdraws back into the pictorial space. In the end, the canvas appears empty and intact once more, as calm and closed as at the beginning.¹

Another copy of this 16-part photo series is held at the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian in Lisbon.


¹ Vgl. Silvia Eiblmayr, in: Exhibition catalogue. Helena Almeida. Galerie im Taxispalais / Galerie des Landes Tirol, Innsbruck 2003.