Vik Muniz

Mixed-media artist Vik Muniz recreates historical artworks with unusual materials, then photographs the results. He’s previously used chocolate, sugar, trash, and toys to appropriate and reinterpret the work of artists ranging from Andy Warhol and Mark Rothko to Caravaggio and Jacques-Louis David. Muniz has exhibited in New York, London, Paris, San Francisco, and Tokyo, among other cities. His work belongs in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Los Angeles County Museum of Contemporary Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo. In addition to his mixed-media works, Muniz has also starred in )Waste Land_ (2010)—an Oscar-nominated film about garbage pickers at a Brazilian landfill—and led a number of social justice–oriented projects that focus on education and development in his native Brazil. In 2001, the artist represented the country at the Venice Biennale.