Joana
Vasconcelos

Joana
Vasconcelos

French & Portuguese, born in 1971


Joana Vasconcelos was born in Paris in 1971 but trained in Lisbon. She draws on traditional Portuguese culture to compose visual poetry where her roots meet modern pop culture. She visually plays with everyday objects, blurring the boundaries between craft and industry, tradition and modernity, popular culture and learned culture.

Her sculptures and installations play with colours and textures, particularly through the use of embroidery. Her photographs, videos and performances conceptually deconstruct daily routines, especially those relating to the status of women.

The installation Coração independente vermelho (Independent Red Heart) by Joana Vasconcelos, which is in the Pinault Collection, was presented during the 2009 exhibition "Un certain état du monde ?" (“A Certain State of the World?”) at the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture in Moscow.