Madalena (from the Aftermath series)

Vik Muniz has a longstanding fascination with the recording of images and the subsequent layering of representation. The works in the Aftermath series take the form of photographs of drawings done by the artist. The layering of images extends further as the street children are asked to pose in the position of a figure they choose from an art history book. This was the starting point for a lengthy series of displacements. The reproduced drawings appear from a distance to be almost photographic in their realism, but on close inspection it becomes clear that the materials are far from conventional. Muniz collected street sweepings left over from the Carnival in Rio and used them to add a suggestive forensic quality to the resonance between material and subject matter.