Joana Vasconcelos is one of the most famous Portuguese artists from the current generation. Her artistic vein may have been due to the fact that she was born in 1971 in the capital of Art and Fashion – Paris, or a result from the influence of her parents, as she was the daughter of Portuguese parents emigrated in France. His father was a photographer and his mother studied at the Ricardo Espírito Santo Silva Foundation, the Decorative Arts Museum.

The nature of the creative process implemented by Joana Vasconcelos is based on the decontextualization and subversion of preexisting objects and everyday realities. Sculptures and installations, revealing exaggerated scale and extreme color relevance, as well as the use of performance and video or photographic records, collaborate in the materialization of challenging concepts of daily routines.

Although it was her dream since she was a young girl, the international recognition of her work was given only when she was 34 years old, with the participation in the 51st Venice Biennale in 2005, with a work named: The Bride (2001-05).

She was the first woman and the youngest artist to be exhibited at the Palace of Versailles in 2012, and since 2005 she didn’t stop projecting her art in the world as she already had an exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (2018) and in the Trafaria Praia project, for the Portugal Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennial (2013). Besides, she participated in the collective “The world belongs to you”, at the Palazzo Grassi Foundation / François Pinault (2011).

With a twelve pages curriculum, you can’t expect less than excellence in her pieces of art. However, surprisingly, in the country of baseball expert picks, the USA, Joana has not exposed yet, so here are our favorites art pieces that will leave you dazzled and maybe will convince the Americans to invite Joana to produce a piece for their galleries.

A Noiva (The Bride) 2001-2005
A five-meter-tall chandelier made from 25,000 tampons. Influenced by the 1960s Nouveau Réalisme movement and the symbolic, tactile constructions of Louise Bourgeois and Eva Hesse. Vasconcelos takes objects and materials from daily life and sets them into new and intricate assemblages.

Due to the reflection of light upon the transparent plastic wrappings of the thousands composing tampons, the chandelier shines like it was actually crystal. This work portraits a very strong message based on the imposition of a hypocritical and repressed feminine sexuality to the corrosive action of irony and ambiguity.

Coração Independente (Red Independent Heart) 2005
The Red Independent Heart presents itself as the gigantic heart of Viana do Castelo (a delightful northern Portuguese city), an iconic piece of Portuguese filigree, filled with red plastic disposable cutlery. Suspended from the ceiling on a vertical axis, evocative of the cycles of life and return of the eternal, inspired by three lyrics, Estranha forma de Vida (Strange Life Form), Gaivota (Seagull) and Maldição (Curse), interpreted by Amália Rodrigues, fado composer and singer of Portuguese music from the second half of the 20th century.

Marilyn, 2009
This enormous piece takes the form of an elegant pair of high-heeled sandals, whose intensified scale results from the use of kitchen pots and lids. Positioned almost symmetrically, the pair refers to the absent figure of Marilyn Monroe.

The pans are associate with the traditional domestic dimension of Women. The huge high-heeled sandal, symbol of the beauty and elegance required in social performance, contradicts the impossibility of the diploid relationship of the Feminine side in the domestic and social life.

Solitário (Solitaire ring) 2018
This one is actually our favorite piece. At around three tons and made up of 112 gold rims and 1,324 glasses of Atlantis crystal, the art piece is the most recent and prestigious work.

According to the artist, "They are two stereotypes together, in one piece". Joana begins by explaining, "It is the symbol of luxury and its longings. On one hand, we have what men want, a high-speed car, gold rims, and drink an extremely expensive whiskey in crystal glasses, on the other we have what women want, a man with a sports car, to offer them the largest diamond ring possible. " It is an idea of happiness "associated with consumerism and expensive symbols and objects".