Mestre Didi

Mestre Didi (Salvador, BA, 1917 - 2013)

Mestre Didi was a sculptor and writer. From childhood, he created ritual objects, learning to manipulate materials, shapes, and objects from the elders of the Obaluaiyê orisha cult. Between 1946 and 1989, he published books on Afro-Brazilian culture, some of which featured illustrations by Caribé. In 1966, he traveled to West Africa, where he conducted comparative research between Brazil and Africa, at the invitation of UNESCO. From the 1960s to the 1990s, he participated as a member of institutes for African and Afro-Brazilian studies and as an advisor at conferences on the same subject, both in Brazil and abroad. In 1980, he founded and presided over the Ilê Asipá Cultural and Religious Society, dedicated to the worship of Egun ancestors, in Salvador. He was also coordinator of the Religious Council of the National Institute of Afro-Brazilian Tradition and Culture, representing the International Conference of Orixás Tradition and Culture in the country.

Reviews

"He expresses, through aesthetic creation, a deep-rooted intimacy with his existential universe, where African ancestry and worldview merge with his Bahian life experience. Completely integrated into the Nagô universe of Yoruba origin, he reveals in his works a mythical, formal-material inspiration. The Nagô language with which he expresses himself is the discourse on the experience of the sacred, which manifests itself through a formal symbolism of an aesthetic nature."
Juana Elbein dos Santos
September 1996, Juana Elbein dos Santos - Mestre Didi is a priest-artist, In: Brazilian Sculpture: Profile of an Identity/curated by Emanoel Araujo and Sérgio Pizoli; texts by Emanoel Araujo, et al. - São Paulo - Official Press. [1997], p. 173.

"Who said slavery would destroy the African genius of sculpture? Black Americans knew how to rediscover—as long as they preserved their gods and continued living the religion of their Fathers—the art of embodying symbols in wood, iron, and clay; and the rhythm of the drums continued thanks to their magical hands, in the rhythm of remodeled matter, musically recreated, both in America and in Africa. In fidelity. As well as in invention. Indeed, African-American art did not remain paralyzed—and, therefore, a sterile repetition. It is still the same ancestral rhythm that survives in Guyana in love offerings, and in Brazil in liturgical objects consecrated to the cult of the Orishas. But this rhythm carries with it, drags in its mad wheel, new symbols, new words of the Gods, here unprecedented forms of love for Black Bosch. For African religion is always alive in Brazil, and Desire never ceases to reinvent its message. The exhibition organized by Deoscóredes dos Santos, beloved son of the Orixás, who gave him this gift of being able to speak with wood, with plant fibers, with all the carnal materials of the world, will be a revelation to the European public of the existence of an African-American art, at once authentic and yet original. (...)"
Roger Bastide
SANTOS, Juana Elbein dos (org.). African Ancestry in Brazil: Master Didi, 80 years old. Graphic design by Beto Cerqueira, Zeo Antonelli; cover design by France Arnaut; introduction by Orlando Senna, Agenor Miranda Rocha. Salvador: SECNEB, 1997, p. 191.

Testimonials

"The orishas of the Earth Pantheon are those who nourish us and help us sustain life. My works are inspired by nature, by Mother Earth - Lama, represented by the orisha Nanã, patroness of agriculture."
Mestre Didi
DIDI, Mestre. Sculptures. Photography by Paula Pape, Marco Aurélio Martins, Michel Rey; introduction by Juana Elbein dos Santos. Salvador: Artist's Proof, 1996, p. 24.

Solo Exhibitions

1964 - Rio de Janeiro, RJ - Orisha Emblems by Didi, at the Bonino Gallery
1964 - Salvador, BA - Solo Exhibition, at the Ralf Gallery
1965 - Buenos Aires, Argentina - Solo Exhibition, at the El Altillo Gallery
1965 - São Paulo, SP - Didi, Sculpture and Orisha Emblem, at the Atrium Gallery
1966 - Rio de Janeiro, RJ - Didi: Afro-Bahian Sacred Art, at the G4 Gallery
1967 - Ibadan, Nigeria - West Brazilian Sacred Art - Didi dos Santos, at Trenchard Hall, University of Ibadan
1973 - Buenos Aires, Argentina - Master Didi and Afro-Brazilian Art - special room, at the Rubbers Gallery
1984 - Belo Horizonte MG - Religion and Blackness: Tradition of the Orixás, at the Imaco Auditorium
1986 - New York (United States) - Solo show, at the Schomburg Center
1987 - Salvador BA - Mestre Didi Memory and Existential Affirmation, at the Bahia Academy of Letters
1988 - São Paulo SP - The Presence of the Sacred in the Sculpture of Mestre Didi - special room, at the International Congress on Slavery - FFLCH/USP
1988 - Salvador BA - Replica of the sculpture Opá Esin, 12 meters high, at Largo do Pelourinho
1992 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - The Presence of the Sacred in the Sculpture of Mestre Didi, at the Ibeu Gallery
1993 - Salvador BA - Solo show, at the Artist's Proof Gallery
1993 - Salvador BA - Solo show, in the Historic Center of Salvador
1994 - Salvador BA - Solo exhibition, at the Artist's Proof Gallery
1994 - Salvador, BA - Solo exhibition, at the Sofitel Hotel
1994 - Salvador, BA - Solo exhibition, at the Art Gallery in the Historic Center of Salvador
1996 - Salvador, BA - Mestre Didi 80 Years of Art, at MAM/BA
1996 - Salvador, BA - Solo exhibition, at the Artist's Proof Gallery - 1st Copene Prize for Visual Arts
1998 - Miami (United States) - Mestre Didi. Sacred Afro-Brazilian Sculpture
2001 - São Paulo, SP - Èdá-Elemi, at the São Paulo Art Gallery

Collective Exhibitions

1966 - Salvador, Bahia - 1st National Biennial of Visual Arts
1968 - Lagos (Nigeria) - International Exhibition of Afro-Brazilian Art, at the Museum of Antiquities
1969 - Accra (Ghana) - International Exhibition of Afro-Brazilian Art, at the Ghana National Museum
1969 - Dakar (Senegal) - International Exhibition of Afro-Brazilian Art, at the Musée Dynamique
1970 - Paris (France) - Art et Culture Afro-Brésiliens - special room, at the UNESCO Palace
1971 - London (England) - Afro-Brazilian Art, at the Africa Centre
1974 - Rio de Janeiro, RJ - Afro-Brazilian Week, at the MAM/RJ
1974 - São Paulo, SP - Black Sacred Art, at the Convention Center
1984 - Salvador, BA - Bahia Africa - Africa Bahia, at the Bahia Art Museum, Vitória Palace
1986 - Salvador, BA - Black Sacred Art, Vitória Hall
1988 - São Paulo, SP - The Afro-Brazilian Hand, at MAM/SP
1989 - London (England) - Art Latin America, at the Hayward Gallery
1989 - Paris (France) - Magiciens de la Terre, at the Centre Georges Pompidou
1991 - Ilhéus, BA - Afro-Brazilian Week, at the Ilhéus Cultural Foundation
1994 - Frankfurt (Germany) - Afro-Brazilian Art and Religiosity, at the 46th Book Fair
1995 - Belo Horizonte, MG - The Heirs of the Night: Fragments of the Black Imaginary, at the Belo Horizonte Cultural Center
1995 - São Paulo SP - The Heirs of the Night: Fragments of the Black Imagination, at the State Art Gallery
1995 - Brasília DF - The Heirs of the Night: Fragments of the Black Imagination, at the 508 Sul Cultural Space
1996 - São Paulo SP - 23rd São Paulo International Biennial, at the Biennial Foundation
1997 - São Paulo SP - Brazilian Sculpture: Profile of an Identity, at Banco Safra
1997 - Washington (United States) - Brazilian Sculpture: Profile of an Identity, at the IDB Cultural Center
1998 - São Paulo SP - Fronteiras, at Itaú Cultural
1999 - Curitiba PR - Arte-Arte Salvador 450 Years, at the Curitiba Cultural Foundation. Solar do Barão
1999 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Arte-Arte Salvador 450 Years, at the Historical Museum of the City of Rio de Janeiro
1999 - Salvador BA - 100 Visual Artists of Bahia, at the Museum of Sacred Art
1999 - Salvador BA - Arte-Arte Salvador 450 Years, at MAM/BA
2000 - São Paulo SP - Brazil + 500 Rediscovery Exhibition, at the Biennial Foundation
2001 - New York (United States) - Brazil: Body and Soul, at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
2001 - São Paulo SP - Trajectory of Light in Brazilian Art, at Itaú Cultural
2004 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - New Acquisitions 2003: Gilberto Chateubriand Collection, at MAM/RJ