Bernardo Mosqueira is committed to building institutions and frameworks that provide meaningful support and create platforms for emerging artists, especially from the Global South, Latin America, and the diasporas. His work bridges artists with institutions: from his leadership of arts organizations and funding initiatives in his home country of Brazil to empower artists with tools for professional success; to curating groundbreaking exhibitions for major institutions around the world, including at the New Museum and the Institute for Studies in Latin American Art in the United States.

In 2017, he was listed as “One of the 20 most influential curators in Latin America” by Artsy. In 2023, Cultured Magazine highlighted Mosqueira as one of the six “visionary curators” in their annual list of Young Curators. Also in 2023, he was named by APOLLO Magazine as “one of the 10 most inspirational thinkers living in the U.S.” in their 40 under 40 list.

Mosqueira’s practice as a curator prioritizes a focus on freedom and transgression: from creating platforms for radical artists and narratives to centering works that expand and reshape conceptions and perceptions of gender, sexuality, spirituality, and community.

“[My practice] is dedicated to the idea that we can always transform the way we perceive the world, that we can always produce more harmonious ways of living together,” he says. Focused on alternate modes of living and existing, Mosqueira’s work is deeply rooted in ​​ethics and justice. He intentionally challenges the categories created by colonialism that unevenly distribute resources and violence.

As a young adult, Mosqueira became interested in the relationship between art and freedom, noticing that art could create spaces for those who felt outcast: the weird, the queer, the unconventional. 

For Mosqueria, developing an exhibition comes from this need to open space for a collective discussion. It’s critical that his curation contributes to advancing a much-needed and relevant topic in society. Ultimately, his work considers the legacy of every initiative, ambitioning that each part involved in an exhibition can, in some way, be positively transformed by it. 

While curating shows is at the center of his practice, Mosqueira is particularly passionate about institution-building, aligned with the belief in the power of art institutions to trigger and nurture transformations in society. “I love researching and experimenting with institutional strategies to make institutions relevant, vibrant, and inspiring. I would be very happy to look back and see that I contributed to the foundation and development of important art institutions.”

Awards & Accomplishments

Institute for Latin American Art (ISLAA) Curatorial Fellow at the New Museum, New York (2021-23)
Premio Lorenzo Bonaldi per l’Arte – EnterPrize, GAMeC, Bergamo (2017-18)