This work is part of a set of six conceived to be displayed on the glass easels during the exhibition Avenida Paulista [Paulista Avenue] (2017). For the exhibition, Longo presented portraits of the presidents of six private cultural institutions located on Avenida Paulista—the Instituto Moreira Salles, the Instituto Cultural Safra, the Centro Cultural Fiesp, Sesc São Paulo, the Instituto Itaú Cultural, and MASP itself—without in fact portraying them. Instead, she left the canvases blank, referring to the figures portrayed only in the works’s titles (the “shot,” in the title). The work thus dialogues with the many portraits in MASP’s collection, alluding to the white monochrome: the apex of a certain history of modern painting, of abstraction and minimalism. On the back of each white portrait (the “counter-shot”), Longo Bahia painted scenes of clashes between police officers and protesters during the demonstrations that took place in the vicinities of the respective cultural institutions, with an indication of the dates on which they were registered—in MASP’s case, June 11th, 2013. Thus, the artist contrasts the elevated realm of artistic activities developed within cultural institutions in one of the main cultural axes of Brazil against the violent confrontations that occurred outside of these institutions throughout the 2010s. To what extent does art reveal or veil the reality of the streets, of the museum’s surroundings? How can MASP’s collection and its crystal easels represent or reflect these confrontations and the contradictions of life outside the museum?

— Adriano Pedrosa

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