Adriano Pedrosa has served as the Artistic Director of Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand (MASP) since 2014. His arrival marked a significant shift in the museum’s curatorial program and the revival of architect Lina Bo Bardi’s original 1968 exhibition design. Mining the museum’s holdings of 17th-, 18th-, and 19th-century artworks, Pedrosa reinstalled the permanent collection using updated versions of Bo Bardi’s glass and concrete easels. Being able to approach these works at any angle has encouraged visitors to chart their own path through the galleries, opening up pluralistic meanings and connections that are often obscured by traditional, chronological displays. The reinstallation provided the foundation for Pedrosa’s pioneering exhibition series Histórias, which launched in 2016, under the theme of childhood, and went on to explore sexuality (2017), Afro-Atlantic histories (2018), women (2019), dance (2020), and Brazilian histories (2022).
Prior to MASP, Pedrosa was the curator in charge of exhibitions and collections at Pampulha Art Museum, Belo Horizonte (2000–03). He has curated numerous exhibitions including InSite_05, an initiative by the San Diego Museum of Art and the Tijuana Cultural Center (2005), the 31st Panorama of Brazilian Art at the Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo (2009), the 2011 Istanbul Biennial, and the São Paulo pavilion at the 9th Shanghai Biennale (2012). Pedrosa has served on the curatorial team for the 1998 and 2006 editions of the São Paulo Biennial. He was the artistic director of the 2nd Poly/Graphic Triennial of San Juan (2009).
Pedrosa has a degree in Law from the Rio de Janeiro State University, and a master’s degree in Art and Critical Writing from the California Institute of the Arts. His work has been published in Artforum (New York), ArtNexus (Bogotá), Flash Art (Milan), Frieze (London), Mousse (Milan), and Parkett (Zurich), among others.