Irineu Destourelles (b. 1974, Cape Verde) studied at Willem de Kooning Akademie, Rotterdam, and Central St. Martins College, London. His work has been featured in exhibitions at Casa Africa, Las Palmas and Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, amongst others.
The historical roots of post-colonial and post-imperial social structures have been the focus of Destourelles's artistic practice across different media, from minimalist text based videos to heavily textured sensual paintings that investigate the way words and images operate to define social group categories. In scrutinizing social contexts, and visual and written texts, Desteurelles acts upon symbols with overloaded historical meanings to explore the resonance of 19th century's dominant discourses (such as, Stuart Mill's political philosophy or Hegel's philosophy of History) on contemporary social relations and thinking-frameworks. He is based between Edinburgh and London.