VIK MUNIZ: A BRIEF HISTORY OF ART

Ben Brown Fine Arts London is pleased to announce its upcoming exhibition, an extensive survey of photographic work by prolific Brazilian contemporary artist Vik Muniz, coinciding with his 60th year.

Vik Muniz: A Brief History of Art brings together a selection of the artist’s most iconic and evocative works from the last two decades and will take place at Ben Brown’s flagship London gallery in addition to an impressive new 130 square metre pop-up space in Mayfair, on Grosvenor Street.

Vik Muniz is renowned for his complex photographic works and unique employment of a wide range of unconventional materials, including dust, sugar, chocolate, diamonds, caviar, toys, junk, scrap metal, dry pigment, vintage postcards and magazine shreds. Muniz is a mastermind of mixed media, who recreates historical artworks with these unusual materials and then captures the result through his unique photography. Taking the viewer on a fantasy tour through time and art history, Vik Muniz: A Brief History of Art presents a broad range of Muniz’s artistic practices, spotlighting him as one of the most ingenious and imaginative artists working today. Originally a sculptor, Muniz grew increasingly interested in the photographic representations of his works, eventually focusing on photography with a broad perspective, from the 15th Century to the present day.

Inspired by artists across centuries and movements, from Sandro Botticelli and Francisco Goya to Van Gogh and Gerhard Richter, the exhibition features re-imaginings of famous masterpieces from the Early Renaissance through to 21st Century masters. Reconstructing images that tap into the viewer’s subconscious visual repository, these works ask us to reconsider the familiar imagery in its altered form. Material constructions are photographed, then either magnified or shrunken in scale, with the final work of art becoming a documentation of his conceptual and artistic processes.