Nicolau Vergueiro

Nicolau Vergueiro spent his childhood in Brazil and the United States, and his sculptures and drawings fuse his diverse experiences and cultural references with his formal training and interest in less traditional artistic practices. Mining mythology and engaging in a kind of personal folklore, Vergueiro’s work contains references to tropicalia, Brazilian indigenous groups, and voodoo, and includes craft-oriented materials such as resin, feathers, ribbon, sequins, and glitter. He blends these low materials with allusions to painting, and his Western influences—Oscar Wilde, Hollywood films, disco, and punk. The resulting sculptural forms and drawings display a handmade quality and syncretize, both materially and aesthetically, Vergueiro’s vast constellation of cultural heritage.