João Onofre

João Onofre was born in Lisbon (1976), where he lives and works.  He graduated in Painting from the Faculty of Fine Arts of Lisbon, and his training also includes the MFA at Goldsmiths College, University of London and a PhD in Contemporary Art at the College of Arts of the University of Coimbra. Awarded for the first time in 2000 with a scholarship from the Institute of Contemporary Art, among other achievements, he was three times a Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation scholarship holder (2000, 2011, 2015), and resident artist at the International Centre Convent de Recollets, Mairie de Paris, in 2003. Exhibiting regularly since the late 1990s, João Onofre gained greater international recognition after participating in the Venice Biennale in 2001 (selected by Harald Szeemann) and in 2010.

His work falls into the area of video, extending also to drawing, photography, performance, and rare objects. Strongly marked by conceptual art, Onofre explores references that range between erudite and popular culture. His initial works refer to performance experiences filmed with a fixed camera: Untitled (We Will Never Be Boring), 1997; or the important trilogy in the artist's studio: Untitled (Vulture in the studio), 2002, Belive (Levitation in the studio), 2002 (work from the MACAM collection), and Catriona Shaw Sings Baldessari Sings Le Witt Re-edit Like a Virgin Extender Version, 2003. Progressively approaching a more cinematic image, as in Untitled (N'en finit Plus), 2010-11 or VOX, 2015, the insistence on repeating an action or the use of the loop as a mechanism that activates, in a circle, the same sequence, is a defining aspect in Onofre's work. 

Of the numerous exhibitions he has held, the following stand out: João Onofre, I-20, New York, 2001; João Onofre, P.S.1. / MoMA, New York, 2002; Nothing Will Go Wrong, MNAC, Lisbon; and CGAC, Santiago de Compostela, 2003. He recently presented his work Tacet (2014), at Chiado 8 - Espaço Fidelidade e Arte, Lisbon; in London and Munich; Untitled (orchestral), at MAAT in Lisbon, 2017, and his work was the subject of the important retrospective Once in a Life Time [Repeat], coordinated by Delfim Sardo at Culturgest, in 2019. His work is represented in several national and international collections.

 

RS, setembro 2020