Vik Muniz in Buenos Aires...

4:00 a.m.

"My art carries no specific messages or a-priori ideas, it's not over when leaving the studio. It finishes when the eye of the observer meets the images and questions start to pop-up..."

Vik Muniz

These words by Muniz, born in Sao Paulo in 1961, summarise pages and pages of written theories about his art by journalists and art critics. They speak of that very instant in which the observer asks himself "How does he do is? How can he shape images from chocolates, puzzle pieces or diamond-dust?". That's the point in which the artwork is completed.

The retrospective exhibition "Vik Muniz, Buenos Aires", currently at the Museo de la Universidad Tres de Febrero, displays an artwork done specially for the city: the typical image of the Obelisk, constructed using stamps from all parts of the world.

Buenos Aires, from the series "Postales de ningún lugar", by Vik Muniz (2015)

Technique: c-print digital / Measures: 180.3 x 279.4 cm

MUNTREF

Muniz builds shapes with a never-ending variety of elements, and then takes a photo of them. The result is a feast for the eye: from afar, an image (for instance, a copy of Picasso's Woman Ironing), but then, up-close, we discover what the image is made of (in that case, garbage).

Woman Ironing, from the series "Imágenes de Basura", by Vik Muniz (2008)

Technique: c-print digital / Measures: 143 x 101.6 cm

MUNTREF

The "Jardín de las Delicias", seen from a close distance, is an overlapping of puzzle pieces. Similar tricks can be seen in other artworks, such as Mona Lisa, a portrait of Elizabeth Taylor and even a G. Stubbs zebra.