Galería Elba Benítez

Vik Muniz

São Paulo, Brazil, 1961
Lives and works between New York, USA and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Vik Muniz creates meticulously crafted visual puns and games, delighting viewers while at the same time raising more thoughtful questions about the nature and mechanics of illusion and representation.

Muniz draws with unusual materials such as chocolate, ash, dirt, or bits of paper, creating trompe l’oeil renderings (often of iconic artworks or culturally resonant imagery) which he later photographs into his own final work. Muniz’s highly-constructed works thus are not only ‘legible’ on various levels but also call attention to their own legibility, conveying an image without concealing the language – or rather, the linguistics — of the image conveyed. As Muniz himself has said: “When people look at one of my pictures, I don’t want them to actually see something represented. I prefer for them to see how something gets to represent something else.”

Beyond the characteristic combination of technical virtuosity and irreverent humor, Muniz’s distinctive practice explores and revels in the instability that exists between craft and mechanical reproduction, between high art and popular culture, between the ephemeral and the perdurable, between the coded and the recognizable.

Download artist’s CVwww.vikmuniz.net

Vik Muniz. Siesta, after Bonnard. Pictures of... Magazine 2, 2011
Vik Muniz. Summer in the City, after Edward Hopper.... Pictures of Magazine 2, 2011
Vik Muniz. Girl reading, after Jean Baptiste... Camille Corot. Pictures of Magazine 2, 2012
Vik Muniz. Flowers, After Warhol, 2012
Vik Muniz. Boy with a pipe, after Picasso (from... pictures of pigments), 2006
Vik Muniz. Orphan Girl at the Cemetary (from... Gordian Puzzles), 2008
Vik Muniz. Edson (Pelé). Pictures of Magazine, 2003
Vik Muniz. Cathedral of Burgos. Pictures of... Chocolate, 2003
Vik Muniz. Crowd at Coney Island (from Pictures of... Paper), 2009
Vik Muniz. Manolete (from Pictures of Chocolate), 2001
Vik Muniz. Death of a Loyalist Militian. Rebus, 2004
Vik Muniz. Mappa del Mondo, after Alighiero Boetti... (from Pictures of Pigment), 2009
Vik Muniz. Townscape Madrid, after Gerhardt... Richter. Pictures of Pigment, 2007
Vik Muniz. 685 Holes. Pictures of Holes, 1997
Vik Muniz. Cloud Cloud, Manhattan. Pictures of... Clouds, 2002
Vik Muniz. Self Portrait (Paper). Pictures of Paper... (Color), 2010
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