Tiago Baptista
The only show is the waiting one

3+1 Contemporary Art is pleased to present O único espectáculo é o da espera [The only show is the waiting one], a solo exhibition by Tiago Baptista (b.1986, Leiria).

Tiago Baptista’s work reflects the relationships established between the one who paints, the one who observes, and the moment of painting and what it presents. Faced with the problem of inhabiting a world loaded with meaning, Tiago Baptista’s oeuvre is nourished by the existing tension between the moment of painting, the figures and shapes represented, but also the language and meaning. This tension is fed by silence, a gaze without excess. Standing before that tension, we are invited to look at shadows, born from the attempt of giving a body to that pact, which is revealed to be mute – a kind of faith in the visible.

The only show is the waiting one, presents a group of paintings in which the slowing down implied in the act of painting, awakens the group of animal figures that take time and its extensions as elementary substances. The distance that separates human understanding from the way other species exist, is also what separates humans from models of essential knowledge and experience. In painting this entails accepting what is imponderable, which is something the artist in this exhibition brings closer to a language in which words are there to be seen. What is proposed here is for us to bring together languages during a vital time, in which, unbalanced, time can be a shadow with tangible measures, which we are invited to see, while waiting.

Translation: Susana Pomba 12.2021

Tiago Baptista (1986, Leiria, Portugal) lives and works in Lisbon. He studied Fine Arts at the Escola Superior de Artes e Design das Caldas da Rainha. His painting is “At first glance (…) like a sequence of landscapes that confront us with images with a powerful cinematographic component, in the sense that each painting is like a moment in a narrative within the spectrum of other narratives.” (João Silvério, 2017). Tiago Baptista has been an artist resident at the Zé dos Bois Association in Lisbon since 2010. He participated in other residential programs at António Duarte Atelier-Museum, Caldas da Rainha (2008-2009), Culturia, Berlin (2013). Tiago was awarded the Aquisição Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso (2015) and selected for the Prémio EDP Novos Artistas (2013) and Prémio Fidelidade Mundial (2009). Regularly exhibiting since 2007, selected solo exhibitions include: Febre, curated by Natxo Checa, Galeria Zé dos Bois, Lisbon (2021); Desenho Sumido, curated by Alexandre Baptista, Espaço Santos + ESTGA, Águeda (2020); Véu sujo, um outro, Projectroom, Art Gallery – Bank of Portugal, Leiria (2019); Atrás do pensamento, 3+1 Arte Contemporânea, Lisbon (2018); A luz em si, A Montra, Lisbon (2014), and Dysfunctional, Atelier-Museu António Duarte, Caldas da Rainha (2009). Collective exhibitions include: Trabalho Capital, from the collection of Norlinda e José Lima, Centro de Arte Oliva, S.João da Madeira (2019); Wait, Berardo Collection Museum, Lisbon (2019); Do Tirar Pelo Natural. Inquérito ao retrato português, National Museum of Ancient Art, Lisbon (2018); Variations Portugaises, CAC Meymac, France (2018); Quote / Unquote. Entre Apropriação e Diálogo, Galeria Municipal do Porto, Porto (2017); Questionamentos, Palácio Vila Flor, Guimarães & Sala de Arte Joven, Madrid (2015); Atlas Secreto, Círculo de Artes Plásticas de Coimbra, Coimbra (2015); Prémio EDP Novos Artistas, EDP Foundation, Casa da Música, Porto (2013) and Anteciparte ’08, Museu da Cidade, Lisbon (2008). His work is represented in the following collections: Colecção de Arte Contemporânea do Estado, Portugal; Lisbon City Hall; Fundação EDP; Coleção PLMJ; Coleção Norlinda e José Lima; Coleção António Cachola, Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Elvas; Coleccion AR2A, La Coruna; Coleccion Navacerrada, Madrid; amongst other Private National and International collections.