Raul Mourão

Brazilian artist Raul Mourão has never been interested in becoming a “specialist.” Working across media is essential to his artistic practice; he utilizes drawing, printmaking, painting, sculpture, video, and photography alike as channels through which to explore the urban experience. Mourão was born in 1967 in Rio de Janeiro. Today he lives and works in New York City, and the metropolitan environment is represented throughout the artist’s work in various capacities. His minimalist drawings and kinetic sculptures echo architectural designs, while the artist’s assemblages transform city materials like fencing and rails into autonomous works of art. Regarding the latter, Mourão’s incorporation of quotidian items is more than an aesthetic decision; these elements offer social commentary and satirize living conditions in some of Brazil’s urban centers, where upper- and middle-class families reside in gated neighborhoods, fenced off from the larger community.

Mourão’s work has been exhibited extensively in Brazil. He is also a curator and a producer as well as the editor of art magazines The Carioca and Item. Between 2000 and 2002, along with Eduardo Coimbra, Luiza Mello, and Ricardo Basbaum, Mourão established and directed the Agora, a gallery in the neighborhood of Lapa in Rio de Janeiro.