Beatriz Milhazes

Beatriz Milhazes, one of the most celebrated Brazilian visual artists working today, will be presenting a series of new prints at James Cohan Gallery beginning March 9, 2007. Her work has been internationally exhibited in numerous galleries, museums and biennial exhibitions. Best known for her exquisite, colorful paintings full of references as diverse as folk art, Carnival decorations, sixties psychedelia, jewelry, embroidery, colonial Baroque imagery, and high Modernism, Milhazes has recently been diversifying her art practice through her exploration of prints and collage, theatrical sets, site-specific public installations and design work including fabric and tapestry. Her work captures the vibrancy and joyfulness that are associated with Brazil, and yet also presents a disorienting energy that may be testament to the artist's own acknowledgement of the exoticized way that Brazilian culture has been packaged to the rest of the world.

James Cohan Gallery will be exhibiting three new large-scale prints made by the artist in collaboration with Durham Press in Durham, Pennsylvania. Fascinated to explore new ways of creating texture, Milhazes masterfully mixes silkscreen and woodblock techniques in these new works, her largest prints to date. Her compositions range from the densely saturated and layered images in Figo (Fig), with its rich hues of blues and greens, to the airy Noite de Verão (Summer Night), which has arabesques and spirals that seem to balance on one delicate point. A large square print that surprises the viewer with its intensity of color, Jamaica also plays with the possibilities of density and transparency in printmaking. The exhibition runs through March 31.

For further information, please contact Jane Cohan at jane@jamescohan.com or telephone 212-714-9500.