José Alejandro Restrepo is one of the pioneers of video art in Colombia and a central figure in contemporary Latin American art. His practice spans single-channel video, video-performance, and video installation, in ongoing dialogue with the documentary image. His work centers on a critique of the relationships between art, history, media, religion, and politics, operating from the hybridization of ancestral and contemporary technologies. For Restrepo, art functions as a dissection of reality and a diagnosis of the contradictions running through the present — a logic that traces directly back to his early medical training. 

He studied in 1981 to the Faculty of Arts at the Universidad Nacional in Bogotá, and between 1982 and 1985 continued his training at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he had direct contact with thinkers such as Deleuze and Foucault, and encountered the work of video artists like Bill Viola and Gary Hill, which confirmed his interest in video installation as the medium best suited to his research. His work has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions, including Terebra (Museo de la Universidad Nacional, Bogotá, 1988), Musa Paradisíaca (Museo de Arte Moderno, Bogotá, 1997), and Teofanías (Museo de Antioquia, Medellín, 2008), alongside participation in international events such as MoMA in New York (2002), the 52nd Venice Biennale (2007), the Mercosul Biennial (2011), the Lyon Biennale (2011), and the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris (2013). He lives and works in Bogotá.