Alice Alexandre Pagan

Nova Aurora – PR, 1980

Alice Alexandre Pagan has a teaching degree in Biology from the University of Mato Grosso, a Ph.D. in Education from the University of São Paulo, and she is a professor at the Federal University of Sergipe. A “trans(MORE THAN)gender” woman and an enthusiast of ecofeminism, she has always used art as an instrument of self-knowledge.

One day, she was invited to give a talk as an act of resistance to the poor treatment received by the exhibition “Queermuseu – cartografias da diferença na arte da brasileira” [“Queermuseum – cartographies of difference in Brazilian art”] in Porto Alegre (2017), and decided to show some of her works to illustrate the talk. As a result of that presentation, she was invited to show her works in an exhibition organized by Museology students of the Federal University of Sergipe. Since then, she never stopped showing her creations.

In 2019, Alice Alexandre Pagan realized the exhibition “PRENDAda e desTRAVAda” at Casa Amor (Aracaju), during the TRANS Visibility Week  – which was the first art show of a trans person in Sergipe. Regarding the conception of the title, the artist recalls: “I was born in the South of the country, where girls were encouraged to learn to paint napkins, crochet and to sew, as a form of preparation for the man. These were the prendada* women. I was not allowed the right to be prenda, given the repression against my femininity. With time, I realized how cruel and revolting the process of construction of the prendada woman is, and I became proud of being a trava** instead of a prenda.

In opposition to what is usually expected of the “PRENDA woman”, Alice’s art as a “TRAVA woman” employs, as technique, precisely the inexistence of technique – as well as a lack of concern for any aesthetics purposefully developed to entice a positive reception from the people who observe her creations. “The use of crochet lines, pantyhose, splatters, and of the stabbed and sewn canvases aims to represent the path of a free woman, who allows herself to live fetiches, rupture dichotomies, and criticize the world made for the machos”, analyzes the artist.

*[The term prenda, from which prendada derives, refers both to a small gift, as well as to different abilities one may have]

**[The dictionary definition of the term trava is “obstruction”, “lock”, but trava is also an informal abbreviation of “travesti”].

Artworks:

“A grega: deusa brasileira” [“The greek: brazilian goddess”] (2018). Acrylic paint, tears, fabric ribbons and flowers. Dimensions: 50cm x 70cm.

“Paz no caos” [“Peace in chaos”] (2017). Acrylic paint on canvas, hand-painted. Dimensions: 40cm x 50cm.

“Tela 7 Nossa Senhora Intersexual” [“Canvas 7 Our Intersexual Lady”] (2017). Acrylic paint on canvas, crochet line, ribbons, and sewn tears. Dimensions: 30cm x 40cm.