Alfredo Jaar was born in Santiago, Chile, in 1956. He attended Instituto Chileno-Norteamericano de Cultura, Santiago (1979), and Universidad de Chile, Santiago (1981). In installations, photographs, films, and community-based projects, Jaar explores the public’s desensitization to images and the limitations of art to represent events such as genocides, epidemics, and famines.

Jaar’s work bears witness to military conflicts, political corruption, and imbalances of power between industrialized and developing nations. Subjects addressed in his work include the holocaust in Rwanda, gold mining in Brazil, toxic pollution in Nigeria, and issues related to the border between Mexico and the United States.

Many of Jaar’s works are ext...