1921, 2017

Frans Krajcberg (Kozienice, Poland, 1921 — Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, 2017).
Sculptor, painter, engraver and photographer. Author of works whose characteristic is
exploration of elements of nature, stands out for its ecological activism, which
combines art and environmental protection.
Born in Poland, Krajcberg received a degree in engineering and arts from the University of
Leningrad. Later, upon moving to Germany, he joined the Academy of
Fine Arts from Stuttgart, where he is a student of the German painter Willi Baumeister (1889-1955).
His artistic career began in Brazil, where he arrived in 1948, seeking to rebuild
life after losing the entire family in a concentration camp during
Second World War (1939-1945).
He lived for a short period in Paraná (isolating himself in the forest to paint) and, in 1951,
participates in the 1st São Paulo International Biennial, with two paintings. Move to
Rio de Janeiro in 1956, where he shares a studio with the sculptor Franz Weissmann (1911-
2005). He became a Brazilian citizen the following year. His paintings from this period tend
to abstraction, with ocher and gray tones predominating. Work on forest motifs
from Paraná, with tangles of vigorous lines.
The artist returned to Paris in 1958, where he remained until 1964. Alternate your stay in Paris
with trips to Ibiza, Spain, where he produces works on modeled Japanese paper
on stones and painted with oil or gouache. These “impressions” are performed with
based on contact with nature and are brought closer, in forms, to landscapes
volcanic or lunar. Also in Ibiza, starting in 1959, it produces the first “lands”
craquelades”
, reliefs that are almost always monochrome, with pigments extracted from
local lands and minerals. As the critic Frederico Morais notes, nature becomes
the artist’s essential raw material.