Pia Camil, They’s Index, 2019

This unique edition by Pia Camil was produced by Nottingham Contemporary on the occasion of the exhibition Split Wall, 2018.

The edition is a miniature version of the artist's mask motif, which populates the artists work both as ceramic sculptures and theatrical props. The masks, inspired by jewellery display busts, engage with Carl Jung’s concept of persona – our public mask or public image. Exquisitely sculpted to resemble the mask, They’s Index doubles as a wearable manicure nail. Camil commissioned a manicurist in a Mexico City street market to make each nail-sculpture, which like jewellery, rests on it’s own cast concrete plinth.

Originally referenced as a prop in Camil’s film They, in which the protagonist 'They' lives inside a mask that resembles a house and performs intimate and private activities within such as lying down reading, eating a sandwich, dancing with abandon or removing nail varnish.

Mexican artist Pia Camil’s (b. 1980, Mexico) work highlights the shortcomings of consumerism and globalisation, exposing the traces it leaves on our day to day and our built environment. Working with textiles, ceramics and video, Camil re-configures these urban failures into works that are playful, interactive, yet socially critical.

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