A central figure in Brazilian modernism, Tarsila do Amaral (1886-1973) created an original and evocative body of work, drawing on the indigenous, popular and modern imaginations of a country in the throes of transformation. In Paris in the 1920s, she tested her iconographic universe against cubism and primitivism, before initiating the "anthropophagic" movement in São Paulo, which advocated "devouring". Her brightly coloured landscapes gave way to unusual and fascinating visions, before a more overtly political dimension appeared in her paintings of the 1930s.
