Donna Huanca creates immersive, multisensory environments in which painting, live performance, sculpture, sound, and scent converge into a total experience of the body. At the heart of her practice is the skin – painted, concealed, and revealed – treated as a universal membrane through which culture, memory, and desire are transmitted. Drawing on Indigenous Andean cosmologies, feminist theory, and ritual practice, her work proposes the body as a site of transformation and transcendence rather than objectification.
Her work has been shown internationally in recent exhibitions and performances, including Donna Huanca and the Temple of Dendur, a commissioned performance at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2025); MINA DE AURA, CAAC – Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, Seville, (2025); UTOPIC CELLS, Zuzeum Art Centre, Riga (2024); SKIN PAINTEENS, Nitsch Foundation, Vienna (2024); Ojos Obsidianos, MAZ – Museo de Arte de Zapopan, Mexico (2023); Portal de Plata, Whitechapel Gallery, London (2022); Aqua Sabia, Kiasma Museum, Helsinki (2021).
Donna Huanca’s work is included in major institutional collections, including the Belvedere Museum, Vienna; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; Rubell Museum, Miami; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and the Yuz Museum, Shanghai.
