Vik Muniz

Amirah Ali Guerra

HUM 201
Oct 2020
Overview

• Thesis
• Background Information
• Vik Muniz
• Wasteland Documentary
• Art Pieces
• Pieces of Garbage
• Flowers
• Conclusion
• References
• Questions
THESIS

• Muniz's work is playful, inviting and daring as he delights in subverting

the viewer's expectations, in such a way that, like magicians, his
artistic trick transcends illusion to produce something you want to
believe in, which transforms lives and raises awareness without
realizing it.
Vik Muniz 1,2

• Visual artist based in New York,

born in São Paulo in 1961.
• Brazilian artist, photographer and
painter
• Known for using perishable and
unstable materials.
• it took him years to think of
himself as an artist
Waste Land Film -
Jardim Gramacho 3,4

• 60 million tonnes of trash

• 321 acres land
• Dangerous place.
CATADORES3
• 3,000 catadores
• Amazing abilities.
• Poor working conditions and
endorsement.

What is garbage to you? Why go

to Brazil instead of gathering
garbage in NY?
Marat (Sebastião)5

• President of Catadores union.

• Le gustaaba leer y eso
• Inspiration came from a bathtub he found.
• Poner en cuanto se vendio
• Remake of Jacques Louis David La Mort de
Marat (1793).
• Who was Marat?
6,7
8
ISIS (Woman Ironing)9
• Hablar de Isis
• Based on Picasso’s Femme de
repassage (1904).
• Reflection on the human
condition.
• Juxtaposition.
10
Irma (The bearer)11
• Not a catadora.

• Based on Van Gogh’s Peasant

Woman Head Sketch (1885)
12
13
Flowers14

•  The Art of Saving a Life,

• Juxta position of something so
dangerous into beautiful means
hope,
• Key message is there is hope if
we can get the funding needed
for those who suffer from it.
• Cells are alive and fluoresce
Conclusion
• Catadores are unseen and unheard, just like viruses and cancer.
• Vik mixes art with social projects.
• Art humanises. It makes us aware of a world beyond our
immediate existence.
• contemporary art can change the lives of ordinary people,
and by extension, change the world.
Muito Obrigado!

Any questions?
References
• https://www.phillips.com/detail/vik-muniz/NY000510/123
• http://www.artnet.com/artists/vik-muniz/biography#:~:text=Vik%20Muni
z%20(Brazilian%2C%20b.,Muniz%20in%20S%C3%A3o%20Paulo%2C%20Br
azil.&text=The%20artist%20began%20his%20career,interested%20in%20
drawing%20and%20photography
.

• Muniz V, Danino T. Flowers. 2015.

• Flaherty J. A Beautiful Wallpaper Made With Smallpox Vaccine
[Internet]. WIRED. 2015 [cited 6 October 2020]. Available from:
https://www.wired.com/2015/02/beautiful-wallpaper-made-
smallpox-vaccine/