Jonathas de Andrade, O peixe [The Fish], 2016. 16mm film transferred to 2K video, 5.1 sound, color; 38 min. Courtesy Alexander and Bonin, New York, and Galeria Vermelho, São Paulo. Produced by Desvia and the Wexner Center for the Arts with support from the Pernambuco Cultural Incentive Fund

Over the last decade, de Andrade has developed works in photography, video, and installation that stem from observations of everyday life in Brazil and what he regards as its “urgencies and discomforts.” In particular, many of de Andrade’s works consider how Brazilian national identity and labor conditions have been constructed against a backdrop of colonialism and slavery. De Andrade’s works also attend to the ways in which attitudes and emotions are shaped—and governed—by images, social conventions, and political ideologies. In his diverse examinations of Brazilian culture and history, he reinterprets the methodologies of education and the social sciences, using nuances of fiction, artifice, and appropriation to undermine assumptions and confound the sensation of truth.