For Tania Bruguera art should be útil (useful). Always interested in creating performances in an environment that will transform 'the audience' into ‘active citizens,’ she works with the interplay between planned actions and spectators’ spontaneous reactions. The goal: actual – not symbolic – transformation. Her performances engage with issues of social responsibility, art ethics, power and control, political representation, and civil society.

Making videos and installations as well as performances, she appropriates the resources of power to create power, doing this through the means of art. With strong formal clarity and ongoing contribution to international conversations on freedom of speech and illegal immigration, Bruguera is re-inventing the language of activism within the field of contemporary culture.