Between Phenomenology and Historicism: Amilcar de Castro as a Blind Spot of the Theory of the Non-Object

ASBTRACT

This article undertakes a critical analysis of Ferreira Gullar’s 1959 Theory of the Non-Object. It historically accounts for its indebtedness to Mário Pedrosa’s 1949 thesis on Gestalt theory and for the debates apropos of concrete art in the 1950s. It also challenges the supposedly neat correspondence between Gullar’s formulations and the neoconcrete artistic production it was supposed to read, emphasising its limits vis-à-vis the work of sculptor Amilcar de Castro.

KEYWORDS:
neoconcretism; Ferreira Gullar; Amilcar de Castro; Mário Pedrosa; Gestalt