Nuno Ramos is a writer and artist. His work takes the form of paintings, installations, sculptures, texts, plays, sambas, and the overlapping of these. His body of work can be understood as a set of isolated or combined attempts to entrench artistic making in matter; to create provisional arrangements of antagonisms; to string together movements; and to set up scenes—conducted by human and non-human actors.

By operating on time and duration, his works address the limits of matter, language, and the art object, placing the artist’s own action and control in fragility. At times vivacious, at others solemn, and in constant dialogue with key figures in Brazilian literature, samba, cinema, and the intelligentsia, the artist’s work also reflects on the country’s political, historical, and cultural reality.

Nuno Ramos began his artistic career in the 1980s at the Casa 7 studio, a group of artists with which he was featured in the 18th Bienal de São Paulo (1985). Since then, he has represented Brazil in the national pavilion of the 46th Venice Biennale, Italy (1995), and participated in the 20th, 22nd, and 29th editions of the Bienal de São Paulo (in 1989, 1994, and 2010, respectively), the Mercosur Biennale (2005, 2015), the II Bienal de la Habana, Cuba (1986), and the 29th Panorama of Brazilian Art, MAM São Paulo (2005), among other international exhibitions.

He was awarded the Grant-Award from the Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation for his body of work in 2006. As an author, he received the Portugal-Telecom Award for the books Ó (2008) and Junco (2011). His most recent poetry book, Jardim Botânico, was published by Todavia in 2023. Over a hundred songs he wrote are recorded.

Ramos held solo exhibitions at MACRS, Porto Alegre (2025; 2016); Biblioteca Mario de Andrade, São Paulo (2022); Sesc São Paulo (2021); Instituto Ling, Porto Alegre (2021); Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, Belo Horizonte (2016); Sesc Pompeia, São Paulo (2016; 1994); Estação Pinacoteca, São Paulo (2015); Fundação Iberê Camargo, Porto Alegre (2014); Caixa Cultural, Rio de Janeiro (2014); MAMAM, Recife (2012); MAM Rio, Rio de Janeiro (2010); Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo (2006); Pinacoteca do Estado, São Paulo (2004); MAM São Paulo, São Paulo (2000); MAC-USP, São Paulo (1988).

His work is part of the permanent collections of Instituto Inhotim, Brazil; Jewish Museum, New York, USA; MAC-USP, São Paulo, Brazil; MAM São Paulo, Brazil; Museu de Arte de Brasília, Brazil; Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, Brasil; Städtische Galerie Villa Zanders, Bergisch Gladbach, Germany; Tate Modern, London, UK; The Deutsch Bank Collection, Germany; Thyssen-Bornemisza, Vienna, Austria; University of Essex Collection of Latin American Art, Essex, UK, and Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, USA.