Rafael Abreu-Canedo: BIO
Born 1984, Brasil.
In 1994, my family immigrated to the US: where schoolteachers spoke in what to me was a mysterious language. Not understanding them, I scribbled my school days away. In time, I began to learn English. In fact, the more I learned, the more I realized that I no longer knew what they were talking about! The math was upside down and I had already mastered some graffiti bubble-letters. My my grafitti letters and caricatures were beginning to compel me. In my doodling, I stumbled into art.
Currently, I operate as an artist by organizing systems and parameters to create intimate and visceral encounters between viewers and the unexpected, the distant and/or the unheard. Whether inviting people to an event where everyone is hearing each other's actual heartbeats, in real-time as they socialize, or projecting slow-motion video close-ups of participants' faces as they transition from straight-faced to ticklish chaos, I am interested in activating subtle, sometimes unrecognized social relations.
My work is deeply tied to my own body, and being. Conviviality and my personal experiences are a source of curiosity which I explore/investigate in a wide range of traditional and non-traditional media.
Through an open-ended approach to art, I explore issues of language, behavior and identity, with focus on systems, the body and space. I've exhibited and taught throughout the US, since 2001, at the age of 16. Since then, I have worked with organizations such as Creative Capital, PFPCA, Franklin Furnace, Queens Museum of Art (New New Yorkers), Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, Halka Art Project, Sprout Fund, Root Division, Oakland Unified School District, New York Department of Education, and Pittsburgh Public Schools, developing a commitment to communication through the arts; changing the future by working for a better today.
