(b.1964, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)

Ernesto Neto's sculpture and installations speak of both the microscopic and the macroscopic. While his vast, immersive installations evoke anatomy and the body's internal landscape, many of his shapes and forms resemble protean organisms - cells or amoebae enlarged to colossal proportions.

Constructed from fragile fabric membranes stretched over skeletal armatures, his sensuous walk-in environments are 'life experiences', to be entered and explored in what he describes as a 'body-mind continuity'. Often augmented by pungent scents, they invite sensory interaction as well as stimulating psychological and intellectual responses.

Although contemplation is an important response, so too are movement, play and interaction. 'The Edges of the World', the labyrinthine installation that Neto created for Hayward Gallery in 2010, incorporated a garden and a swimming pool, as well as social spaces and spaces within which the visitors themselves became sculptural elements.