João Fahrion

João Fahrion (Porto Alegre, RS, 1898 – idem 1970). Painter, illustrator, engraver and teacher. From 1918 to 1920, he took classes with the Italian sculptor Giuseppe Gaudenzi (1875-?) At the Parobé Technical School. In 1920, realizes its first exhibition in the upstairs of the shop Esteves Barbosa, in the native city. His drawings attract the attention of the governor of the time, Borges de Medeiros (1863-1961), who grants him scholarship to study in Europe.

Between 1920 and 1922 he resides in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Berlin and Munich, Germany, where he experiences the cultural effervescence of the Weimar Republic. It is during this period that the Bauhaus, the German architect Walter Gropius (1883-1969), the early plays of the German playwright Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956) and some of the European vanguards, such as Expressionism and Surrealism. He studied lithography and painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin, but returned to Porto Alegre without completing his training.

He exhibits at the National Salon of Fine Arts in Rio de Janeiro, where he receives a bronze medal in 1922 and a silver medal in 1924. During this period he also works as a decorator, as well as producing illustrations for the Diário de Notícias newspaper. In 1929, he was employed in the illustration studio of the Globo publishing house. Besides covers for several books, such as Nights in the Tavern, by the writer Alvares de Azevedo (1831-1852), he makes illustrations for Revista do Globo. He began lecturing in his atelier in 1936. He left Globo Magazine in 1937 and taught painting and drawing of a live model at the Free Institute of Fine Arts of Rio Grande do Sul.

The following year, he founded with other artists the Associação Riograndense de Artes Plásticas Francisco Lisboa. From the 1940s, he produced several portraits commissioned by the elite of Rio Grande do Sul and began to frequent the night scene of the city and produce drawings of bars, theaters and cabarets. At age 66, he retires due to severe depression. During his career, he holds several solo exhibitions in Porto Alegre. After his death, his paintings compose several collective exhibitions, such as the Biennial Brasil Século XX, in 1994, in São Paulo.