Mira Schendel

Mira Schendel Untitled 1964/1965 10 works: Monotype (oil) on rice paper on cardboard From 46.2 x 23 cm to 50.5 x 26.5 cm. 4 works signed and dated 'Mira, 64', 6 works signed and dated 'Mira, 65'. - With minor signs of age. Provenance Private collection, Berlin Mira Schendel is one of the most influential artists of the 20th century in Latin America. Born in Zurich in 1919 to Jewish parents, she received a Catholic education in Italy. In 1938, fascist persecution forced her to abandon her philosophy studies and leave the country. She emigrated to Brazil via Yugoslavia, Switzerland and Austria and settled in São Paulo. Language is at the center of her extraordinary, poetically reduced work. It draws on a wealth of influences; her Jewish and Catholic background plays just as much a role as elements of Western and Eastern philosophy, Zen Buddhism and concrete poetry. Schendel paints and draws in a wide variety of media and also works sculpturally. Her work culminates in her monotypes on semi-transparent rice paper from the 1960s; they are considered her most significant and independent works.