Mira Schendel

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Often depicting loosely arranged letters, words and symbols, as well as enigmatic line compositions and delineated fields of colour in different textures and media, Schendel’s practice spanned painting, sculpture, drawing and monotype printmaking. Born Myrrha Dagmar Dub in Zurich and raised in Milan, Schendel fled the country on the eve of the Second World War in 1939, and later emigrated to Brazil in 1949, eventually settling in São Paulo. Her artistic methods were informed by her sustained engagement with semiotics, theology and Heideggerian philosophy; these means of expression allowed her to go beyond the often-restrictive limits of language. By transforming surface and symbol into sites of bodily experience Schendel’s art offers to open-up language and allow ‘the unutterable to enter it toward the totally different,’ which is to say ‘non-language.’

With contributions by Dr. Pia Gottschaller (Courtauld Institutite of Art, London), Dr. Isobel Whitelegg (Leicester University), Francesco Stocchi (Maxxi, Rome) and Dr. Yuval Etgar (University of Oxford), brings to light a new understanding of Schendel’s use of materials as means to define drawing and painting in spatial and sculptural terms. Mira Schendel: In Transit is published by Buchhandlung Walther König in collaboration with Luxembourg + Co., the Estate of Mira Schendel, Gomide&Co, Schwartzman& and Lisson gallery, on the occasion of an exhibition by the same name, held at Luxembourg + Co., London in October 2026.