Vita Evangelista

Campos dos Goytacazes – RJ

Born in Brazil, Vita Evangelista currently resides in Rio de Janeiro, after having lived the last decade in the Netherlands. They work with video, digital media, writing, and performance. Considering counter-hegemonic and transfeminist forms of knowledge and their embodiments, Vita claims various technologies and languages of representation that characterize the current configuration of the world we inhabit. Focusing on the ways in which subjectivities are mediated, they search for intuitive possibilities of creating auto-techno-poetic narratives, attempting to challenge dominant views of control and surveillance of the human body.

Complementing their practice by performing in the context of other artists’ works, Vita cherishes the collaborative re-imagination of what it could mean to not live in isolation, but rather in relation.

Vita has a degree in Arts from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie and an MA degree in Critical Studies from Sandberg Instituut (both in the Netherlands). In the last five years, their works have been exhibited in different Dutch contexts, including the Stedelijk Museum, the Eye Filmmuseum, Frascati Theater, W139 Gallery, Brakke Grond, Niewe Vide, Korzo Theater, Lost & Found, De School, Neus Gallery, Perdu, Kunstpodium T, Josilda da Conceição Gallery, Art Chapel, DordtYart, and Gemeente Amsterdam. They have also participated in collective shows at Galeria Cavalo (2017), Fosso (2019), and UFF (2017) in Brazil, as well as in Germany, France, Belgium, and had their first solo show in Liverpool, England (2017). They have also participated in the artistic residency programs Pivô Pesquisa Ciclo II (2020) in Brazil, and QTOPIA—Queer Arts Festival (2019), in the Netherlands.

Inherent to their artistic practice, Vita’s writings have been published by arts and culture platforms, amongst which are the Dutch magazines Simulacrum, NXS, and Damn Magazine, and the Canadian bilingual newspaper Cigale. Vita has also been invited to speak at Gerrit Rietveld Academie (NecRomances, Audiovisual Department), at the Film House Cavia, and at the BAK – basis voor actuele kunst (2.Dh5 Festival), in the Netherlands.

Artworks:

“Undead Nature” [original title in English] (2019). Video. Direction, Editing, and Text: Vita Evangelista. Duration: 16’ 59”. Available here.

“Unwound” [original title in English] (2019). Performance with virtual reality and video. Direction, Editing, and Text: Vita Evangelista. Duration: 09’ 41”. Available here.

“Step up” [original title in English] (2017). Installation and video. Direction, Editing, and Text: Vita Evangelista. Duration: 05’. Available here.