Galerie Downtown presents “Tropicalism” exhibition

Born in Brazil in the late 1960s, Tropicalism is a global cultural movement that has developed in fields as varied as music and design. Quickly spread outside Brazil’s borders, it has influenced emblematic European designers such as Charlotte Perriand who, after collaborating with Le Corbusier and Lucio Costa on the design of the Maison du Brésil in Paris, met Oscar Niemeyer and drew inspiration from the variety of Brazilian woods. The exhibition “Tropicalism” opened this week at Downtown Gallery, shows the furniture created by Perriand for her apartment, which combines local Brazilian woods with her European style. Right next to the 1962 “Bureau ‘en forme'”, the drawings and collages of Brazilian architecture icon Oscar Niemeyer and the creations of Zanine Caldas constitute the exhibition that François Laffanour’s guests came to discover. Among them, gallery owners Kamel Mennour and Jacques Lacoste, artist Johan Creten, designer Pierre Hardy and the Brazilian Ambassador to France, Mr Paulo Cesar de Oliveira Campos…