Mario N. Ishikawa is one of the exponents of Conceptual Art in Brazil. His pieoneering work in Xerox Art, Mail Art and Offset incorporated “alternative media” as more accessible vehicles for the production and circulation of artistic objects. He also works as a painter, designer and sculptor. From the beginning of his career, in the late 1960s, he chose to use industrial materials, such as plywood sheets painted with automotive paint. In these early works, he addresses political themes and the formation of subjectivity amid the censorship and violence of the time. Throughout his career, Ishikawa has incorporated visual elements from advertisement, comic books and political slogans, using these images to criticize ultranationalist discourses and denounce human rights violations. In the 1980s, his work began to address themes related to nature and the transformation of organic matter, using soot and the manipulation of fire as materials. 

Since the beginning of his career, he has taken part in important group shows such as the Bienal de São Paulo (1967 and 1989); the 1st Bienal Nacional de Artes Plásticas, in Salvador (1966); Arte Xerox Brasil, Pinacoteca de São Paulo, Brazil (1984); Arte Novos Meios/Multimeios: Brasil 70/80, Museu de Arte Brasileira da FAAP, São Paulo, Brazil (1985); Bienal Brasil Século XX, Fundação Bienal de São Paulo, Brazil (1994); as well as various group shows focusing on the production of Japanese-Brazilian artists. 

His solo exhibitions include Mario N. Ishikawa: sítio arqueológico, presented at Almeida & Dale, São Paulo, Brazil, as part of the Transoceanic Perspectives project (2023). Mario Ishikawa’s work is in the collections of Pinacoteca de São Paulo, Brazil; Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo – MAC USP, Brazil; MAM São Paulo, Brazil; Centro Cultural São Paulo – CCSP, Brazil; among others.