In every life story including artistic biographies there are some unexpected, almost fateful events which leave a long-lasting, indelible, and proliferatively productive permanent mark. One such event, which, at first, appeared to be accidental, connected for good, at the time, a young Brazilian artist and student of the Hochschule für Gestaltung (School of Design) in Ulm in Germany, Almir Mavignier, with our country. His sudden stay in Zagreb in 1960 resulted in establishing contacts with domestic artists and critics, and, indirectly, it lead to the idea and realisation of the exhibition of the New Tendencies in Zagreb in 1961 as the first exhibition in a row of five which followed during the 1960s and 70s. Namely, if Mavignier had not by chance visited Zagreb and met with people gathered around the Gallery of Contemporary Art, this exhibition which owing to its challenging nature changed artistic perception in the Croatian cultural scene, would have never come to life. When we consider this exhibition and its contribution from today's perspective, it is necessary to reiterate Mavignier's leading role in this important initiative. Moreover, even this exhibition in Novigrad seems to be the product of this past event. The exhibition was triggered by Mavignier's recent visit to the Adriatic coast on the occasion of artistic gathering in Poreč of former participants of the New Tendencies exhibitions in Zagreb and some other artists of similar artistic orientations and art historians interested in this problem field.
Following his stay in Zagreb at the beginning of the 1960s, Mavignier's artistic career was constantly on an upswing. Acting in a strong German artistic milieu, he achieved a considerable international reputation which is testified by numerous references in terms of artistic works, exhibitions and lecturing posts in his CV. Cooperation with the groups Zero and Nul, participation on the events organised by the magazine and the gallery Azimuth&Azimut, exhibiting works at Venice Biennial and Documenta in Kassel, participation on the exhibition The Responsive Eye in the Museum of Modern Art in New York is just a fraction of what he has achieved during his artistic career. As a contemporary, pupil and colleague of Max Bill and Joseph Albers, he became a member of the family of constructivist artists making no distinctive difference between pure aesthetic and functional artistic procedures. Most of all, he cherishes pure and clear mode of expression as well as sensitivity and sharpness of plastic idea as his linguistic, and, ultimately spiritual and moral artistic position.
For his exhibition in the Rigo Gallery, Mavignier has envisaged a specific ambient installation, adapted to the available space, which, notwithstanding necessary limited number of exhibited works, is enough to reveal the very core of the artist's creative mode of expression by means of forms, colours and signs. In accordance with the tenets of the art Mavignier has constantly been dealing with, we are presented with graphically, instead of manually, multiplied original artefacts. Furthermore, in the same vein, these works are the products of intertwining visual and textual content in the medium of "additive posters" as the artist himself tends to identify this specific genre of his opus. There are specific parameters and terms to be used for perceiving, understanding and interpreting Mavignier's art: system, structure, concept, construction, programme, multiplication, permutation, perception, information, communication. However, notwithstanding the stated terms which resemble scientific categorisation, there is no fear that his art lacks imagination and sensitivity. On the contrary, this art represents a specific imaginative and sensitive mode of artistic expression as envisaged by the artist who has been brought up, who has formed himself and developed pursuant to traditional constructive formulation culture the ideals of which Mavignier has strictly been nurturing and applying. Namely, it would be too much if art repeated, supported and reinforced disorder and chaos of contemporary world. Art should avoid these tendencies, or even oppose them in order to preserve spiritual sense, ethic integrity and human measure without which it cannot survive today and, possibly, will not be able to survive in future.
Ješa Denegri