Olga Blinder

Olga Blinder (1921 in Asunción, Paraguay – 19 July 2008) was a Paraguayan painter, engraver and sculptor. Blinder was born in Asunción into a Jewish family. She lived through the Chaco War, World War II, the 1947 Paraguayan Civil War, in addition to Paraguay's coup d'états in 1954 and 1989. Blinder was also a licensed professor who taught arts and creative education for over 30 years. Her works include numerous published books and articles on education and art. She is the former director of the Escolinha de Arte of Paraguay in the Brazilian Cultural Mission and of the Instituto de Arte (ISA) of the National University of Asunción.

Personal life Olga Blinder was born into a Jewish family in Asunción, Paraguay. As a child, her father was supportive of her art passion allowing her to draw and enrolling her in art classes. She lived during a time of political strife and upheaval that heavily influenced her view of the world and of society. At university she studied engineering and pedagogy at the Paraguay Atheneum. In 1943, Blinder married Dr. Isaac Schvartzman. The couple had three children named Silvia Susana, Carlos Eduardo, and Jorge Bernardo.

Education She studied engineering at the Paraguay Atheneum from 1939 to 1943 and graduated in pedagogy. She attended a painting course at the Paraguayan University in 1948.

Career Olga Blinder studied painting with João Rossi and Ofelia Echagüe Vera, having her first exhibition in 1950 at the Ateneo Paraguayo, followed by an exhibition in 1952 at the Paraguayan-American Cultural Center. Some of her most notable work comes from the group she formed in 1954 called Grupo Arte Nuevo (New Art Group), alongside Josefina Plá, Lilí del Mónico, José Laterza Parodi, Edith Jiménez, Ruth Fisher and others. This unique group broke away from the naturalism that had dominated art during the 19th century, and instead turned towards expressionism. Central themes they emphasized include humanity and society. The group's aesthetic lacked unity but its art related to constructivist abstraction, stylizations of figuration, and social realism. She was known as a fundamental promoter of change among the Paraguayan art circles. Blinder was particularly influential in the introduction of modernism to Paraguayan art during the 1950s and 1960s, turning to social realism as the foundation of her work. Her style was known for being expressive and containing hard, rigorous depictions of roughness, generally involving people as the central theme. A key component throughout Blinder's work was the depiction of women, usually rural and indigenous, partaking in everyday tasks of working and nurturing.

Throughout the 1960s Blinder utilized striking and simplified body forms in woodcut images as a central component of her artwork.

During her lifetime she participated in a variety of international exhibitions in places such as Holland, Venezuela, Argentina, Spain, Chile, Lisbon, Colombia, Uruguay, and the United States.

Artwork Pareja Triste, 1957 One of her most famous pieces of art is her oil on burlap painting, Pareja Triste, completed in 1957. The painting depicts two individuals, yet their facial features seems to be mirror images of each other, both displaying a morose appearance with their eyes turned downwards and their mouths frowning. The individuals seem to be displaying some sort of immense grief that is shared between them, as seen with their overlapping bodies and the dark tones utilized in the painting. The dark blue and brown hues create a somber tone. The boundaries of the man and woman's body parts are so interwoven that it becomes difficult to distinguish who is who. The painting is said to show an interpersonal experience and shows the contextualization of psychopathology.

Los Torturados, 1963 Blinder has another famous series of woodcuts titled Los Torturados [The Tortured] (1963), in which employs two formats. The first is works where bodies are lined up and sometimes placed on top of each other and the second is works where the human body that is depicted is placed at the edge of the sheet. These two methods create a sense of suffering, confinement, and restriction that the imprisoned body experiences. She also depicted decomposing bodies where there were parts of bone, flesh, and fragments shown.

Inútil Espera, 1968 In her piece Inútil Espera (Useless Wait), done in 1968, Blinder makes use of the female body by referencing a "semantic field that associates more universal aspects of female experience with the specific situation of Paraguayan women - waiting for companions in exile or for political change in the country." In this piece she also makes reference to the oppression everyday people faced during the dictatorship of Stroessner.

Exhibitions Source:

INDIVIDUAL:

Asunción, 1952 Asunción, 1956 Asunción, 1959 (retrospective) Asunción, Brazilian Cultural Mission, (1972) Rosario, 1959 Buenos Aires, 1962 Rosario, 1966 / Madrid, 1969

COLLECTIVE:

Asunción, 1951 Asunción (First Feminine Hall) 1952 Asunción (Second Feminine Hall) 1953 San Pablo (Biennales) 1957, 1959, 1961, 1963 Asunción (First Week of Modern Art) 1954 Buenos Aires (first joint of Paraguayan art since 1934) 1954 Asunción (Art fairs) 1961, 1962, 1963, 1964 Tokyo (engraved Biennial) 1962 / Santiago (engraved Biennial) 1964 Córdoba (II Hispano-American Biennial) 1964 Buenos Aires (engraving, joint ) 1964 Buenos Aires (jointly with Colombino) 1965 Buenos Aires (jointly with Colombino and Josefina Plá) 1966 Biennial of Coltejer, Medellín, Colombia, 1970 Exhibition of Color Prints, New Jersey, United States, 1970 II Biennial International Engravings of Buenos Aires, 1970 Carpí (Italy) Exp. Of Contemporary Woodcut, 1972.

Collections Source: Escala: Essex Collection of Art From Latin America Museo Paraguayo de Arte Contemporáneo Museo de Arte Indígena Museum of Ceramics and Fine Arts Julian de La Herreria

Honors and awards Source: Plaqueta de Oro, Municipality of Córdoba: II Hispano-American Biennial 1964 Decoration of the Order of the Baron of Rio Branco, Brazil, 1973 Integración Latinoamericana Award

Publications Source: Arte Actual en Paraguay 1900-1980 Olga Blinder 1956-1985 Comentarios Vistos Con Sus Ojos Antología Retrospectiva 1950-1990