Lygia Pape - Neo-concrete Art

Neo-concrete Art

After her involvement with the Frente Concrete artists, Lygia Pape transitioned into the short wave of Neo-concrete art. Pape was a signatory of the Neo-concrete Manifesto, along with Lygia Clark and Helio Oiticica. The Neo-Concretists believed that art represented more than the materials used to create, but that it also transcended these "mechanical relationships". The manifesto claimed that art does not just occupy mechanical space, but it "transcends it to become something new." Neo-concrete artists aimed to create a new expressive space in which an artwork is a living being to have a relationship with and to experience through the senses. Thus, Neo-concrete artworks usually required the viewer's active participation.

The Neo-concrete artists did not totally reject Concrete art. Concrete art remained the basis of Neo-concrete art, but it was reformulated. Neo-concrete artists adapted concrete art's geometric shapes and transformed them into organic three-dimensional objects to be manipulated by participants and to be experienced sensorially. The works intended to counteract the urban alienation created by a modern society and integrate both the intellect and the physical body for meditative experiences.