REMOVED at Rio Innovation Week

Aerial perspective of 165’ long REMOVED Installation at RIW, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, August, 2025

This past August, I had the extraordinary opportunity to present REMOVED at Rio Innovation Week in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Thanks to the vision and dedication of curator extraordinaire André Weller, the exhibition was staged at Pier Mauá on a massive scale—dozens of my photographs printed large, mounted on light boxes, and backlit against the harbor. Over the course of five days, more than 200,000 attendees experienced the installation.

One of the most memorable aspects was how the work transformed at night. As the sun set over the ocean and Pier Mauá, the backlit photographs came to life—confronting visitors after long days of talks and demonstrations about the future of technology. In a space filled with conversations about innovation, AI, and human-centered design, REMOVED offered a moment of pause and reflection: what happens to us, and to our relationships, when devices mediate so much of our presence?

While in Rio, I was also able to create a few new works for the series, which I’ll give a teaser of below. I was fortunate to make new friends during my travels—something that has always been one of the most rewarding aspects of this project. Spending time with people, even briefly, to share in their lives and culture, adds perspective and appreciation for how vastly similar and different we all are. The more places I experience, foods I taste, and languages I’m immersed in, the easier it becomes to suspend judgment in times of misunderstanding and to give people the space to be who they are.

Rooftop in Rocinha, Brazil. Photo by Marcos Braz

Our screens are increasingly dividing us, as the new addiction to rage proves wildly profitable for the advertising ecosystem. I wish more people had the chance to step outside of their echo chambers to realize that everyone carries their own pains, struggles, and needs—and that if we truly listened, the world would be a much more peaceful place.

Exhibitions like this are, to me, the pinnacle application of REMOVED. Whether experienced as large-scale installations or as editioned fine art silver prints, encountering the work off the screen and in physical space is where I believe true transformation begins.

These new Rio works just barely made the deadline, but they will be included in my upcoming book REMOVED: elsewhere, everywhere, nowhere, which is in the final stages of layout and moving toward print. Big announcements about the book and signing events will be coming soon. (Though my negatives did suffer some light exposure when a TSA agent inadvertently opened a film box during hand inspection—always an occupational hazard of traveling with film!)

Paulo, Rocinha, Brazil, 2025

And there’s more ahead: next week I’ll debut a video piece at Cyprus Art Week in Greece. In early December, my work will be included in Boredom – a diverse experience at the Vögele Kultur Zentrum in Pfäffikon, Switzerland. And closer to home, my photograph Angie and Me is currently featured in a group show at Rick Wester Fine Art, New York City, which runs until October 4. View the exhibition here.

I’m grateful to everyone who helped bring REMOVED to life in Rio and to the thousands who engaged with the work there. More to come very soon.