Mário Silésio

Mário Silésio de Araújo Milton was born in Pará de Minas, Brazil, in 1913, and died in Belo Horizonte in 1990. A painter, draughtsman, muralist and stained-glass artist, he studied law at the Universidade de Minas Gerais before devoting himself to the visual arts. In the 1940s he attended the Escola Guignard in Belo Horizonte, where he was a pupil of Alberto da Veiga Guignard and Franz Weissmann. In 1953 he received a grant from the French government and left for Paris, where he studied with André Lhote.

His training with Guignard and his contact with modern art contributed to the development of a language close to geometric abstraction. In his compositions, the intensity of the colour accompanies the articulation of lines, curves and planes, reconciling formal discipline with freedom of experimentation. This investigation extended from painting to the creation of stained glass and ceramic panels, with a significant presence in the architecture of Belo Horizonte.

Between 1957 and 1960 he carried out interventions in public and private buildings in the city, among them the Banco Mineiro da Produção, the Teatro Marília and the law faculty of the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. Of particular note is the ceramic panel "Abstrato", of 1959, conceived for the façade of the former building of the Departamento Estadual de Trânsito. He also produced works for the Clube dos Engenheiros in Araruama and, in 1964, the stained-glass windows of the church of Ferros.

He was awarded distinctions at the first two editions of the Salão Nacional de Arte Moderna in Rio de Janeiro, in 1952 and 1953. In 1962 he received the Prémio Leirner de Arte Contemporânea at the Galeria de Arte das Folhas in São Paulo.

After his death, his work continued to feature in exhibitions devoted to the history of Brazilian art, including the "Bienal Brasil Século XX" in 1994 and "Arte Construtiva no Brasil: Coleção Adolpho Leirner", presented at the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo in 1998 and at the Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro in 1999. In 2007 he was represented in "Dimensions of Constructive Art in Brazil" at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

His work is held in the art collection of the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais and in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, where the "Estudo para mural da Faculdade de Direito de Belo Horizonte", of 1958, from the Adolpho Leirner Collection of Brazilian Constructive Art, is to be found.