Born in Popayán, Colombia, Oscar Muñoz studied art at the Instituto Departamental de Bellas Artes in Cali in the 1970s. As an art student, he began making drawings based on photographic images and, although his studies did not specifically include photography or audiovisual media, these media and their relationships to reality and meaning-making subsequently became central to his artistic practice.

Muñoz is also known for his use of ephemeral materials in poetic reflections upon memory and mortality. For example, Aliento (1995-2002) consists of a series of seemingly blank mirrors. However, when the viewer comes close to them and breathes on them, subtle obituary portraits emerge momentarily on the surface. Muñoz’s video Re/trato (2004) shows the artist painting a self-portrait with water. As the water makes contact with the hot pavement Muñoz is painting on, the portrait vanishes. Muñoz often bridges the media of film, video, photography, installation, and sculpture.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Colombia was wracked by a war between feuding drug cartels and the Colombian government. Muñoz’s installation Ambulatorio consists of a large aerial photograph of that city printed on a sheet of shattered security glass. Viewers walk on top of the glass floor, looking down upon the city. The work was inspired by a bombing; walking through Cali after the bomb exploded, Muñoz was fascinated by the prevalence of fragments of glass, encrusted into the pavement.

In 2006, Muñoz founded "lugar a dudas," a cultural center and residency program for artists. Located in Cali, lugar a dudas (space for doubts) has become a center for young artists to work through ideas and participate in a dialogue and public debate about art and politics.

Muñoz has shown his works in numerous important solo exhibitions, including Oscar Muñoz: Protografías, Banco de la República, Bogotá, Colombia (2014); Oscar Muñoz: Eclipse, Casa Daros, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2013); Oscar Muñoz: Biografías, Fundação Joaquim Nabuco (FUNDAJ), Recife, Brazil and University of New Mexico Art Museum (UNMAM), Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA (2014); Oscar Muñoz: Ambulatorio Belfast, Golden Thread Gallery, Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK (2012); Oscar Muñoz, Hasselblad Award, Göteborgs konstmuseum, Gothenburg, Sweden (2018); Oscar Muñoz: Re/trato, High Line Art, New York City, New York, USA (2013); Oscar Muñoz: Protographies, Jeu de Paume, Paris, France (2014); Oscar Muñoz, Narcisos, Aliento, Ministerio de Educacion y Cultura (Centro MEC), Montevideo, Uruguay (2002); Protografías, Museo de Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia and Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA), Argentina (2012); Oscar Muñoz, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Monterrey (MARCO), Mexico (2014); Oscar Muñoz: Protografías, Museo de Arte de Lima (MALI), Peru andMuseo La Tertulia, Cali, Colombia (2013); Oscar Muñoz, Museo de Arte Moderno de Bogotá (MAMBO), Colombia (1995); Cronicas de la ausencia, Oscar Muñoz y Rosângelo Renno, Museo Tamayo, Mexico City, Mexico (2009); Oscar Muñoz: Invisibilia, Phoenix Art Museum, Arizona, USA (2021) and Blanton Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA (2022); and Oscar Muñoz: Sedimentaciones, University of South Florida Contemporary Art Museum (USFCAM), Tampa, Florida, USA (2014).

Muñoz’s works are represented in several major collections including Biblioteca Luis Ángel Arango, Bogotá, Colombia; Blanton Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA; Centre Pompidou, Paris, France; Daros Latinamerica Collection, Zurich, Switzerland; Fundacio Sorigué, Lleida, Spain; Fundacion "la Caixa," Barcelona, Spain; Hasselblad Foundation Collection, Gothenburg, Sweden; Higashikawa International Photo Festival Collection, Japan; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington DC, USA; Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), California, USA; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, New York, USA; Musée du quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, Paris, France; Museo de Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia; Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA), Argentina; Museo de Arte Moderno de Medellín (MAMM), Colombia; Museo Jumex, Mexico City, Mexico; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), Massachusetts, USA; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), Texas, USA; Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York City, New York, USA; Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), Florida, USA; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania, USA; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), California, USA; Tate Modern, London, England, UK; and UBS Art Collection, New York City, New York, USA.