Vik Muniz on Photography, Mind, and Matter

In this volume of The Photography Workshop Series, Vik Muniz—known for his playful pictures that complicate what is understood as a photograph, sculpture, or painting—offers his insight into thinking creatively and seeing the familiar in new and surprising ways.

Aperture works with the world’s top photographers to distill their creative approaches, teachings, and insights on photography—offering the workshop experience in a book. Our goal is to inspire photographers of all levels who wish to improve their work, as well as readers interested in deepening their understanding of the art of photography. Through images and words, Vik Muniz—whose signature style appropriates and reinterprets iconic images—shares his creative practice and discusses a wide range of topics, from generating ideas and creating artworks that challenge viewers’ perceptions, to thinking through collaboration, imperfection, and the interplay of subject, scale, and material. 

Format: Paperback / softback
Number of pages: 128
Number of images: 70
Publication date: 2025-08-05
Measurements: 7.5 x 10 x 7.5 inches
ISBN: 9781597114455

Vik Muniz (born in São Paulo, 1961) is a prolific, internationally recognized artist, whose signature style appropriates and reinterprets iconic images of our time. His work is featured in major collections, including the Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo; and Victoria and Albert Museum, London. He has published many books, including the Aperture titles Reflex: A Vik Muniz Primer (2005) and Postcards from Nowhere (2020). Waste Land, a documentary about his work in the favelas and landfills around Rio de Janeiro, was nominated for an Academy Award in 2010.

Lucas Blalock is a Brooklyn-based photographer whose work is in the collections of the Dallas Museum of Art, Guggenheim Museum, Hammer Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Portland Museum of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art, among many others. His work has been featured in publications including Arforum, the New York Times, New Yorker, Art in America, Brooklyn Rail, BOMB Magazine, W Magazine, British Journal of Photography, and Time.