Details

First Name

Sofia

Last Name

Borges

Username

sofiab

Bio

Lives and works in New York, USA. Born in Ribeirão Preto, Brazil.

Sofia Borges is a conceptual artist who – for the past fifteen years – has been using photography to investigate philosophical notions around the relationship between matter, image and meaning. Considered one of the most pivotal Brazilian contemporary artists of her generation, in the first seven years of her career Borges developed a large and resounding body of works exploring photography and the expanded philosophical understanding of images. Following on from this, in the last five years, she began to produce installations and intricate practices that exercise the idea of a total artwork via complex curatorial projects and performances.

More recently, she has also incorporated assemblage and painting into her image research.

In 2016, she published The Swamp, an award-winning book-artwork that celebrates her first philosophical phase. In 2018, she co-curated the São Paulo Biennial, for which she put together a complex curatorial proposal in the form of a tragedy, which occupied an entire floor in the Biennial Pavilion. In 2021, Borges wrote and directed her first film The Fossil, the Eye and the Fire – considered a second act of her book-artwork – in which she investigates the relationship between her biography and the investigative practices that happens in the studio.

For seven years, she lived between São Paulo and Paris, dedicating herself to the research of pre-historical caves, as well as working at myriad art museums and paleontological and archeological research centers. After this crucial period living between Central Europe and Brazil, and photographing caves, museums, and natural history research centers, Borges began to spend extended periods of time in Greece, studying alchemy, mythology and theater. During this second 7 years phase in her career, the artist deepened her research into the relationship between culture and meaning and its models of representation, such as the frameworks of religions, myths and theater, unfolding an intense dialogue between myth and matter, the material and the metaphysical.
In 2022, from being awarded by the Jerusalem International Fellows in the US, the artist spent three months in Jerusalem, where she investigated the tragic and the sublime, focusing on the geopolitical representation of sacred spaces. She also worked with Palestinian youth groups in collaboration with the Jewish institution. At the end of 2022, the artist moves to New York City.

Website

sofiaborges.carbonmade.com

Country of residence

United States (US)

Exhibitions

Exhibitions

FILM
2 0 2 1
The Fossil, The Eye and The Fire, Foam Talent Award 2020 – Amsterdam, Netherlands

CURATORIAL PROJECTS
2 0 1 8
33rd São Paulo Biennial [affective affinities], The Infinite history of things or the end of the tragedy of One – São Paulo Biennial Foundation, Ciccillo Matarazzo Pavilion, Brazil
2015
No Sound – Galeria Millan, construction site – São Paulo, Brazil

SOLO EXHIBITIONS & DUOS
2 0 2 1
Degas Borges – MASP, Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand, Sao Paulo, Brazil

The Sun, The Sun. But The Unconcious of The Sun – Mendes Wood DM Gallery, Brussels, Belgium
2 0 2 0
It Was A White And Blazing Blind Fire – Kandlhofer Galerie, Vienna, Austria
2 0 1 9
The Ashes, the Mirror, the Reverse of Brightness and the Becoming of Fire – Mendes Wood DM, Sao Paulo, Brazil
2 0 1 7
No Mold For White But No Mold For Fire – Float Gallery, Athens, Greece
2 0 1 6
Black Chalk and White Charcoal or The Myth of The Absent Matter – Foam Fotografiemuseum,Amsterdam, NLD

The Swamp – Photo London, Mack Stand, London, UK
Sound, Shape and Meaning – Kandlhofer Gallery, Vienna, Austria

2 0 1 5
I Don’t Know I’m the Author I Can’t Say I’m Looking – White Project Galerie, Paris, France
2 0 1 4
The Philosopher’s Photocopy | Theo Michael and Sofia Borges – Steve Turner Contemporary, Los Angeles, USA
2 0 1 3
Les Artifices – White Project Galerie, Paris, France
Os Nomes – BES-Photo Award, Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo, Brazil
Impossível – Galeria Millan, São Paulo, Brazil
Os Nomes – BES-Photo Award, Museu Berardo, Lisbon, Portugal
Paralaje | Pablo Accinelli and Sofia Borges – Galeria The Goma, Madrid, Spain
Reincidencia y Paradigma – Galeria OMR, Mexico City, México
2 0 1 2
Estudo Para Ausência – 30ª Bienal de São Paulo: A Iminência das Poéticas – Pavilhão da Bienal, São Paulo, Brazil
Tema – Centro Cultural São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
2 0 1 1
Tema – Museu do Estado de Pernambuco – Recife, Brazil
Estudo da Paisagem – Galeria Artur Fidalgo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Pré-História – Galeria Virgílio, São Paulo, Brazil
2 0 1 0
Recalque – Casa de Cultura UEL, Londrina, Brazil
2 0 0 9
Ambas – Centro Cultural São Paulo – São Paulo, Brazil
Sofia Borges | Portraits and Self-portraits – Centro Cultural da Justiça Federal, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Sedimentos – Galeria Virgílio, São Paulo, Brazil
Sofia Borges – Museu de Arte de Ribeirão Preto, Ribeirão Preto, Brazil
2 0 0 8
Sofia Borges FOTOGRAFIAS – Centro Universitário Maria Antônia, São Paulo, Brazil.

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2 0 2 1
Imagens que não se conformam – MAR Museu de Arte do Rio, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
2 0 2 0
Foam Talent Award 2020, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Foam Talent Award 2020, Berlin, Germany
2 0 1 8
Il Coltello Nella Carne – Padiglione d’Arte Contemporanea (PAC), Milano – Italy
7th Daegu Photo Biennale – Daegu Arts Center – Daegu, South Korea
Being: New Photography – The Museum of Modern Art – New York – USA
CORPO A CORPO: a disputa das imagens, da fotografia à transmissão ao vivo – Instituto Moreira Salles – Rio de Janeiro – Brazil
2 0 1 7
CORPO A CORPO: a disputa das imagens, da fotografia à transmissão ao vivo – Instituto Moreira Salles – São Paulo – Brazil
2 0 1 5
Imagine Brazil – DHC, Montreal, Canada
A to Z – White Project Galerie, Paris, France
Arte Atual Festival – Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo, Brazil
Rêve Caverne/Art contemporain & Préhistoire – Château Musée – Tournon-sur-Rhône,France
De Mineralis, pierres de visions – commissaire Institut d’art contemporain – Villeurbanne/Rhône-Alpes, France
Imagine Brazil – Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo, Brazil
NO SOUND – Galeria Millan, São Paulo, Brazil
ID – Retrato Contemporâneo por Artistas Brasileiras – Festival Paraty em Foco, Paraty, Brazil
O Tempo da Duração – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
2 0 1 4
Here There (Huna Hunak) – Al Riwaq Exhibitihion Space, Doha, Qatar
Made By Brazilians – Cidade Matarazzo, São Paulo, Brazil
Imagine Brazil, MAC LYON – Musée d’art contemporain de Lyon, France
Duplo Olhar, Paço das Artes, São Paulo, Brazil
Singularidades / Anotações _ Rumos Artes Visuais 1998-2013 – Itaú Cultural, São Paulo, Brazil
Imagine Brazil – MAC Lyon, Lyon, France
Repentista – Gallery Nosco, London, UK
2 0 1 3
Imagine Brazil – Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo, Norway
Voir est une Fable – La Réserve Hotel, Paris, France
Redbull House of Art, Redbull Station, São Paulo, Brazil
Draft Urbanism – Biennial of the Americas, Denver, USA
Fotonovela – III Fórum Latino-Americano de Fotografia, Itaú Cultural, São Paulo, Brazil
Lugar Nenhum – Instituto Moreira Sales, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
30ª Bienal de São Paulo: A Iminência das Poéticas – Palácio das Artes, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
30ª Bienal de São Paulo: A Iminência das Poéticas – SESC-SP, Bauru, Brazil.
2 0 1 2
Fronteiras – Casa Contemporânea, São Paulo, Brazil
2 0 1 1
Eu Me Desdobro em Muitos – Centro Cultural do Banco do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Geração 00: A Nova Fotografia Brasileira – SESC Belenzinho, São Paulo, Brazil
Porque Sim – Galeria Millan, São Paulo, Brazil.
Ficções – CineEsquemaNovo Cinema Festival, Porto Alegre, Brazil
2 0 1 0
Tateando o Redor – RedBull House of Art, Edifício Sampaio Moreira,São Paulo, Brazil
Diário Contemporâneo de Fotografia – Museu UFPA, Belém, Brazil
38º Salão de Arte Luiz Sacilotto – Paço Municipal, Santo André, Brazil
2 0 0 9
Trilhas do Desejo – Rumos Itaú Cultural – Itaú Cultural, São Paulo, Brazil
Porto Seguro Fotografia – Espaço Porto Seguro, São Paulo, Brazil
10º Salão Vitor Meireles – Museu de Arte de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, Brazil.
2 0 0 8
Menos Vinte Um – Paço das Artes, São Paulo, Brazil.
Arte Pará – Fundação Rômulo Maiorana, Belém, Brazil.
Brasil BR – Galeria Virgílio, São Paulo, Brazil.
Marcelo Amorim and Sofia Borges – Ateliê 397, São Paulo, Brazil
33º SARP – Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Ribeirão Preto, Brazil.
11º Bienal de Santos – Centro de Cultura Patrícia Galvão, Santos, Brazil.
Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Jataí, Jataí, Brazil.
36° Salão de Arte Luiz Sacilotto – Paço Municipal, Santo André, Brazil.