Antoni Muntades is one of Spain's most internationally renowned contemporary artists. He is seen as a pioneer of conceptual art, especially media art, in Spain and his career has spanned more than 40 years. He seeks to detect and decode the mechanisms of control and power through which the hegemonic viewpoint is constructed, and to explore the key role of the mass media in that process. His works are often processual and participative in nature, and he uses a wide range of supports and discursive strategies including video, photography, multimedia installations, publications, the Internet, interventions in public spaces and the activation of collaborative, inter-disciplinary research projects. His work stands at the crossroads of art, social science and communication systems. The mechanisms and effects of globalisation, the nature of communication in today's world and the way in which it contributes to the spreading and censoring of ideas, processes of cultural homogenisation, the imperatives of the consumer society, an analysis of the art system, social media control and thoughts about colonisation processes and their impact on present-day societies are just some of the themes that appear in his output as a visual artist and explorer. He sees his works as 'artefacts' in the anthropological sense of the word, i.e. as liable to be activated in different ways depending on the context and the time, based on a wish actively to engage the reader or spectator in the artistic, exploratory experience. Hence his motto 'perception requires involvement', in the conviction that involvement in turn can help to shape critical subjectivity or combat 'the construction of fear'. With these assumptions, dialogue between his works and their respective contexts is fundamental.
In 1971 he moved to New York, but he has taken part in seminars, debates and workshops in Europe, America and Asia. In 1977 he joined the CAVS (Center for Advanced Visual Studies) at MIT as a guest researcher, and continued to work there until 2014. He currently works at the Dipartimento di Culture del Progetto of Iuav University in Venice. Since 1995 he has grouped part of his works and projects under the title On Translation. He has recently produced series called About Academia, Asian Protocols, Strategies of Displacement and The Construction of Fear. In 2019 he embarked on the series Exercises on Past and Present Memories, in which he reviews the history and colonial memory of Spain and the Philippines, the complex process of exchange that it involved and its impact on the present.
His art can be found in leading museums and public collections at home and abroad, and he has many exhibitions and publications to his name. His works have been shown at the MoMA in New York, the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive in California, the Musée d’art contemporain de Montreal, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid, the Museum of Modern Art of Buenos Aires, the Museum of Modern Art of Río de Janeiro and the MACBA in Barcelona. He won the Spanish National Award for Plastic Arts in 2005 and the Velázquez Award from the Spanish Ministry of Culture in 2009, and has obtained grants and awards from numerous prestigious international institutions. He has also taken part in international events such as Documenta 6 (1977) and Documenta 10 (1997), the Venice Biennales of 1976 and 2005 and the Whitney Biennial of American Art (1991), to name but a few.
Antoni Muntades is one of Spain's most internationally renowned contemporary artists. He is seen as a pioneer of conceptual art, especially media art, in Spain and his career has spanned more than 40 years. He seeks to detect and decode the mechanisms of control and power through which the hegemonic viewpoint is constructed, and to explore the key role of the mass media in that process. His works are often processual and participative in nature, and he uses a wide range of supports and discursive strategies including video, photography, multimedia installations, publications, the Internet, interventions in public spaces and the activation of collaborative, inter-disciplinary research projects. His work stands at the crossroads of art, social science and communication systems. The mechanisms and effects of globalisation, the nature of communication in today's world and the way in which it contributes to the spreading and censoring of ideas, processes of cultural homogenisation, the imperatives of the consumer society, an analysis of the art system, social media control and thoughts about colonisation processes and their impact on present-day societies are just some of the themes that appear in his output as a visual artist and explorer. He sees his works as 'artefacts' in the anthropological sense of the word, i.e. as liable to be activated in different ways depending on the context and the time, based on a wish actively to engage the reader or spectator in the artistic, exploratory experience. Hence his motto 'perception requires involvement', in the conviction that involvement in turn can help to shape critical subjectivity or combat 'the construction of fear'. With these assumptions, dialogue between his works and their respective contexts is fundamental.
In 1971 he moved to New York, but he has taken part in seminars, debates and workshops in Europe, America and Asia. In 1977 he joined the CAVS (Center for Advanced Visual Studies) at MIT as a guest researcher, and continued to work there until 2014. He currently works at the Dipartimento di Culture del Progetto of Iuav University in Venice. Since 1995 he has grouped part of his works and projects under the title On Translation. He has recently produced series called About Academia, Asian Protocols, Strategies of Displacement and The Construction of Fear. In 2019 he embarked on the series Exercises on Past and Present Memories, in which he reviews the history and colonial memory of Spain and the Philippines, the complex process of exchange that it involved and its impact on the present.
His art can be found in leading museums and public collections at home and abroad, and he has many exhibitions and publications to his name. His works have been shown at the MoMA in New York, the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive in California, the Musée d’art contemporain de Montreal, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid, the Museum of Modern Art of Buenos Aires, the Museum of Modern Art of Río de Janeiro and the MACBA in Barcelona. He won the Spanish National Award for Plastic Arts in 2005 and the Velázquez Award from the Spanish Ministry of Culture in 2009, and has obtained grants and awards from numerous prestigious international institutions. He has also taken part in international events such as Documenta 6 (1977) and Documenta 10 (1997), the Venice Biennales of 1976 and 2005 and the Whitney Biennial of American Art (1991), to name but a few.