Adriano Costa

Adriano Costa explores consumption, fashion, horror, and society’s anxieties by juxtaposing a collection of objects with abstract yet often realistic sculptural forms. Working across a range of materials and media – including sculpture, assemblage, drawing, painting, and installation – Costa’s work emerges as a sharp commentary on social class, popular culture, music, and youth.

Throughout Costa’s practice, there is a deep engagement with reality that relies on tragic irony rather than originality within the creative process. He stretches a reflection on the true value of a work of art, probing the question of how common or even noble materials can be transmuted into an art object and vice versa. 

Adriano Costa (b. 1975, São Paulo, Brazil) lives and works in São Paulo.   

His solo exhibitions include We Wont Be Disappointed: The Paris Spin-Off, Au_Passage, Paris (2025); We Wont Be Disappointed, Pivô, São Paulo (2025); Elfen, Furstenberg Zeitgenossisch, Donaueschingen (2025); Sweet, Mendes Wood DM, Paris (2025); 1 metro de cabelo, Mendes Wood DM, São Paulo (2025); ax-d. us. t, Emalin, London (2024); MILK OF SLUMS – RUA DOS CACIQUES, Mendes Wood DM, New York (2023); YOUR WORK AND ITS CONSEQUENCES, Emalin, London (2022); CEMITÉRIO, City SALTS, Birsfelden (2022); Philosophy of the World, Mendes Wood DM, Brussels (2022); ROCKWHORESHOW, Nuno Centeno, Porto (2019); wetANDsomeOLDstuffVANDALIZEDbyTHEartist, Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne (2018); B A  I   L  E, Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo (2018); DearMeatCutsDevilMayCry, David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles (2016); Every Camel Tells a Story, Mendes Wood DM, São Paulo (2015); Touch me I am geometrically sensitive, Sadie Coles HQ, London (2014). 

Additionally, his work has been included in institutional group exhibitions such as Zhumqposeon, F.E.A, ФАА initiative, Athens (2025); Lygia Clark: The I and the You and Sonia Boyce: An Awkward Relation, Limited Editions, Whitechapel Gallery, London, (2024); Cruella De-vil, Galerie Sultana, Paris (2024); The Rough Grace Of A Bard, FLATS, Brussels (2024); 118½, Emalin, London, (2024); Primary Forms: III edition, Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw (2023); HISTÓRIA(S) DA ARTE, Serralves, Porto (2022); Breaking The Waves, Chi K11 Art Museum, Shanghai (2021); Everyday Poetics, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle (2017); Frucht & Faulheit, Lothringer13 Halle, Munich (2017);  IMAGINE BRAZIL, Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo and Musee d’Art Contemporain de Lyon, Lyon (2014); Under the Same Sun: Art from Latin America Today,  Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2014).