Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, b. 1948

Cildo Meireles creates complex installations and sculptures that entice the viewer and challenge political, philosophical, and aesthetic precepts. Meireles’s artistic practice was shaped by the social and political conditions during the dictatorship of Brazil in the 1960s and ‘70s, and by the Neo-Concretism and avant-garde movements. Like his predecessors, Meireles merges physical, cerebral, and sensorial elements in works that elicit audience participation. While Meireles’s works are often created in response to specific political events and situations, they evoke universal themes that are communicated through the viewer’s experience in a shared, rigorously designed and defined space. Meireles’s work has been exhibited internationally, including the Biennales of Venice, Italy (1976, 2003, 2005, 2009); São Paulo, Brazil (1981, 1989, 1998, 2010); Documenta, Germany (1992, 2002); and Istanbul, Turkey (2003, 2015). The artist has been the subject of several large-scale and traveling solo exhibitions at renowned institutions, including Sesc Pompeia, Sao Paulo, Brazil (2019); Centro Nacional de Arte Contemporaneo Cerrillos, Cerrillos, Chile (2019); Fundação de Serralves, Portugal (2014) HangarBicocca, Milan, Italy (2014); Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Spain (2013); Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona, Spain (2010); Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico (2010) and Tate Modern, England (2008).