Rodrigo Cass, the Brazilian artist known for his minimal monochrome works, in which he applied liquid concrete to canvas, has died.
While his work referenced Brazilian Neo-Concretism, it was in the forms of classical Catholic iconography that Cass took his greatest inspiration, informed by his own faith and early training as a Seminarian.
On to the concrete surface Cass might carve gestural, curving, lines, or partial geometric and diagrammatic patterns.
Between 2000 and 2008, Cass was a member of the Carmelite Order, and in 2006 he completed a degree Faculdade Santa Marcelina in São Paulo. Between 2007 and 2008 he studied Philosophy and Theology at the Jesuit Faculty of Philosophy and Theology in Belo Horizonte.
Cass exhibited at Centro Cultural São Paulo, São Paulo; Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel, São Paulo; Galeria de Arte Copasa, Belo Horizonte; Galerie MDM, Paris, France; Meyer Riegger, Karlsruhe, Germany; and MALG – Museu de Arte Leopoldo Gotuzzo, Pelotas.
The artist died while swimming off Copacabana beach in his home city of Rio de Janeiro.
