Carla Zaccagnini
(1973–)
Carla Zaccagnini
1973–
Carla Zaccagnini (1973– ) is an artist, curator, and critic. She views her work in these three areas as mutually constitutive forms of inquiry that all contribute to a research-driven and conceptually holistic practice. Zaccagnini’s work is interested in recontextualizing objects and ideas to point out the limits of history and in using subtle transformations of the everyday to provoke a reconsideration of language, the fallibility of perception, and the construction of knowledge.
Zaccagnini uses historical research in conjunction with a variety of artistic media ranging from drawing, installation, performance, text, video, and curating to produce a body of work that explores cultural exchanges and social displacement, especially as it refers to the history of Brazil. In this way, her work serves as a conceptual instrument to undo existing constructions of history in pursuit of remaking multi-vocal, nuanced, and often opposing presentations of history and the production of knowledge.
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Zaccagnini’s family moved to Brazil in 1981, where she spent most of her life. In 1995, she obtained a BFA from the Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado in São Paulo where she studied with artist Nelson Leirner. Leirner encouraged her to use her artistic practice to explore theoretical questions about history and representation. She later received an MA in Visual Poetics from the Universidade de São Paulo in 2004. She currently lives and works in Mälmo, Sweden, where she is a professor of conceptual and contextual practices at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. Her work has been exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions since 1997, and she is currently represented by Gallery Vermelho, São Paulo.