The best a man can get, 2014
Digital video, color, 16:9, 2’31”, AAC stereo



The best a man can get is an early work by Joao. It is a video piece that consists of a performance executed by himself looking at the mirror, struggling and exploring issues concerning his own indentity and the capitalistic dreams that shape the masculine construction of gender.

The title follows an iconic sloggan by one of the most famous personal care brands targeting a masculine audience. Coincidentally, this slogan has been used since 1989, precisely the year Joao was born.

Joao explores the problematic of how brands such as Gillete shape our construction of gender, conforming us to stereotypes of masculinity and capitalise on our search for collective identity by providing emptied, meaningless and toxic and unatainable role models.

The ritual starts by being played as scripted in the ad, but ironically, it is also the shaving foam seems to progressively allow him to express his own individual and distorted identity.