Mexico City, Mexico, 1980
Lives and works in Mexico City.

Pia Camil was born in 1980 in Mexico City, where she continues to live and work. Her work has been shown in Mexico, Colombia, France and the U.S. Camil received her Bachelor’s of Fine Arts from The Rhode Island School of Design in 2003 and her Master’s of Fine Arts from The Slade School of Fine Art in 2008. In 2009, she formed El Resplandor, a performance-based band. She has received awards including the European Honors Program, Palazzo Cenci, Rome, Italy in 2001 and she was nominated for The Paul Hamlyn Award, London in 2008. Camil’s work is in the permanent collection of La Colección Jumex, la Colección Patricia Phelps de Cisneros and the Wattis Museum amongst others. Her solo exhibitions include “The little dog laughed” at Blum and Poe, Los Angeles, “Entrecortinas: abre, jala, corre” at OMR Gallery, Mexico City, “Espectacular Telón” at Sultana Gallery, Paris, and “Cuadrado Negro” at the Basque museum-center of contemporary art in Spain.

Through her work Pia Camil has shown a proclivity to failure or the decaying associated to the mexican urban landscape, aspects of modernist culture and traces of art history. Her practice has explored the urban ruin – including paintings and photographs of halted projects along Mexico’s highways (highway follies); abandoned billboards that become theatre-like curtains therefore theatricalizing failed capitalist strategies (espectaculares), or the problems and contradictions that arise when engaging with iconic art works (No A trio A or Cuadrado Negro).

Video

CV

Education

2008
Master of Fine Arts, The Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK

2003
Bachelor of Fine Arts, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island, USA

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2023
Lover’s Rainbow, Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, USA (permanent)

2022
Organismo Multi Orgásmico, Sultana Galerie, Paris, France

2021
Nidos y Nudos, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, USA
Three works, Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson, Arizona, USA

2020
Velo Revelo, Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, USA
Ríe ahora, llora después, OMR, Mexico City, Mexico

2019
Here Comes the Sun, Performance, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York City, USA
Fade Into Black, Queens Museum, Queens, New York, USA
Bara, Bara, Bara, Tramway Art Space, Glasgow, UK

2018
Split Wall, Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham, UK
They, Galerie Sultana, Paris, Franc
Telón de boca, Museo Universitario del Chopo, Mexico City, Mexico
Divisor Pirata, Performance, DO DISTURB Festival, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France
Fade into Black, SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, Georgia, USA

2017
Bara, Bara, Bara, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, USA
SOLUNA International Music & Arts Festival, Performance, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, USA
A Pot For a Latch, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany

2016
Divisor Pirata, NuMu (nuevo museo de arte contemporáneo), Guatemala
Here and Now, Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Germany
Pia Camil: A Pot for a Latch, New Museum, New York, USA
Slats, skins and shop fittings, Blum and Poe, New York, USA
Lodos presenta una Obra de Teatro, PEEE (Parque experimental El Eco), Museo Experimental El Eco, Mexico City, Mexico
A Pot for a Latch, Manetti Shrem Museum, Davis, California, USA

2015
Skins, Curated by Justine Ludwig. Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, USA
United States of Latin America, Curated by Jens Hoffmann and Pablo León de la Barra. Museum of Contemporary Art, Detroit, USA

2014
The little dog laughed, Blum and Poe, Los Angeles, USA
Entrecortinas: abre, jala corre, OMR, Mexico City, Mexico

2013
Espectacular Telón, Sultana Gallery, Paris, France
Cuadro Negro, part of the program Mutatis Mutandis in Artium, Basque Museum-Center of Contemporary Art. Victoria, Spain

2010
Lost In You (A Performance That Never Happened), open studio performance, Mexico City, Mexico

2009
El Resplandor, El 52 (project space and residence program ran by OMR Gallery), Mexico City, Mexico

2005
Retar a la muerte sosteniendo la respiración bajo el agua (in collaboration with Carlotta Manaigo), Proyectos Monclova, Mexico City, Mexico

2004
Pensando en Ti (Thinking of You), permanent intervention in public parking lot, Mexico City, Mexico

2003
Cuantos Cuentos Cuentas, Temporary gallery space, Mexico City, Mexico

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024
The Life of Forms, Hayward Gallery, London, UK (from February)

2023
HOW WE GATHER, Mandeville Art Gallery, San Diego, USA (from October 7)
A soft place to land at MoCa Cleveland, Cleveland, USA
In a far-off land… at FRAC Champagne Ardenne, Reims, France
Beautiful Repair. Mending in Art and Fashion at Copenhagen Contemporary, Copenhagen, Denmark

2022
Shake Your Body, LAGO/ALGO, Curated by Jérôme Sans Mexico City, MX
Intervención/Intersección: MASA at Rockefeller Center, Curated by Su Wu, New York, USA
Forms Follow Energy. LAGO/ALGO, Mexico City, Mexico
ARS22. Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki, Finland

2021
Unending Beginnings, USC Roski Graduate Gallery, Los Angeles, USA
QUINCEAÑERE, 15 Años de DiabloRosso. DiabloRosso, Curated by Pablo Leon de La Barra, Panama.
In Some Form or Fashion. The Momentary,  Arkansas, USA
Elementos Vitales. MASA Gallery. Curated by Su Wu, Oaxaca, Mexico
Sartor Resartus. Huset for Kunst & Design, Denmark
Excepciones Normales: Arte Contemporáneo en Mexico, Museo Jumex, Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico

2020
Air Out Your Dirty Laundry. Curated by Laura Copelin, Sarah Melendez, Daisy Nam. Ballroom Marfa. Texas, USA
OTRXS MUNDXS, Museo de Arte Contemporaneo Tamayo.Curated by Humberto Moro and Magali Arriola. Mexico City, Mexico
Protext!, Centro Pecci. Prato, Italy. Curated by Camilla Mozzato e Marta Papini. Entrée dans la ronde, Château de Montbazillac, Dordogne, France

2019
Aichi Triennale 2019: Taming Y/Our Passion, curated by Pedro Reyes, Nagoya, Japan
Portadores de Sentido. Arte Contemporáneo en la Colección Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, curated by Sofia Hernández Chong Cuy, Museo Amparo, Puebla, Mexico
Lover’s Rainbow, Desert X Biennial, curated by Neville Wakefield, Coachella Valley, USA.
Formes Limites: Pratiques de la céramique et sculptures contemporaines, Beaux-Arts de Paris, Paris, France

2018
The Domestic Plane: New Perspectives on Tabletop Art Objects, The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Connecticut, USA
Women House, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC, USA
Art Basel Cities, Buenos Aires, Argentina
LISTE, with Galerie Sultana, Basel, Switzerland

2017
Deshechas, duo exhibition with Ofelia Rodriguez, Instituto de Visión, Bogota, Colombia
Womenhouse, Monnaie de Paris, Paris, France
Performance!, curated by Bernard Blistène & Marcella Lista, le Tripostal, Lille, France

2016
Everyday Reflections in Abstraction, SPACE, Irving, USA
Opening exhibition, Ladera Oeste, Guadalajara, Mexico
Hausbesuch, Museum Ludwig, Köln, Germany
¿Cómo te voy a olvidar?, Perrotin Galerie, Paris, France

2015
Frieze Projects 2015, Frieze New York, USA
Pia Camil, Pablo Helguera, Pedro Reyes, MIMA, Middlesbrough, UK

2014
Ir para volver, 12th Biennale of Cuenca, Cuenca, Ecuador
Arroz Sem Sal, Silvia Cintra Gallery, Curated by Kiki Mazzucchelli, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

2013
Draft Urbanism, Biennal of the Americas, Colorado Curated by Carson Chan, Denver, USA
No A Trio A, “En casa” project a La Casa Encendida, Curated by Luisa Fuentes Guaza, Madrid, Spain
Horizontal, La Central gallery. Bogota, Colombia.

2012
Popo de Paris, Sultana Gallery, Paris, France
Arteba, curated by Pablo León de la Barra, Buenos Aires, Argentina

2011
Solo Projects Art-Rio, International Contemporary Art Fair of Rio de Janeiro, Curated by Pablo León de la Barra and Julieta Gonzalez, Brazil
El Grito, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León (MUSAC), Curated by Sofia Hernandez Chong Cuy and María Inés Rodríguez, Spain
Zona Maco Sur, Curated by Adriano Pedrosa, Mexico City, Mexico
Proyectos Ultravioleta, Curated by Beatriz Lopez, Guatemala

2010
El Resplandor performance, Miami Art Basel, Creative Time and Tamayo Museum programming for Ocean Front, Miami, USA
Sin techo está pelón, A selection of work from La Colección Jumex, Curated by Michel Blancsubé, Universidad de Guanajuato, Mexico
Draw, Museo de la Ciudad de México, An exhibition curated by Erik Foss, Curse Mackey and Miguel Calderón, Mexico City, Mexico
El Resplandor, Museo Experimental Eco, Mexico City, Mexico
Zona Maco, Contemporary Art Fair, Mexico City, Mexico

2009
Artbo, La Central, Colombia
There are false problems…, Proyectos Monclova, Monterrey, Mexico
Resplandor, El 52 Gallery Space, Mexico City, Mexico
[sic], OMR Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico
Names and Places, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney, Australia
This is not an invitation, it’s a presentation, curated by Pia Camil in collaboration with Stefan Brüggemann, El 52 Gallery Space, Mexico City, Mexico

2008
Illumination, an Interval project, Manchester, UK
Lanzarote, Keith Talent Gallery, London, UK
Post Graduate Degree Show, Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK
Woburn Studios, Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK
Croyances Quotidiennes, Palais Université Robert Schuman, Strasbourg, France
Kate Moss Drawings, Galería de Arte Mexicano, in collaboration with artist Stefan Brüggemann, Mexico City, Mexico. In collaboration with Stefan Brüggemann
Taenu, TactileBOSCH Gallery, Cardiff, Wales, UK

2007
Interim Show, Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK
Eventos Sociales, Mexican Art Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico
Trace: Recent Works From Slade Post-Graduates, The Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK
Turtle, Woburn Studios, The Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK

2006
Fire and Ice, drawing study, Nina Menocal Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico
MACO Art Fair, Nina Menocal Gallery Stand, Mexico City, Mexico
Cinco: A Multi-Media Exhibition From Five Contemporary Mexican Artists, Black Book Magazine, New York City, USA

2005
To Challenge Death by Holding Your Breath Underwater, Proyectos Monclova Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico
Morir de Amor, MUCA, UNAM (National Autonomous University Museum of Contemporary Art), Mexico City, Mexico

2004
El Sueño de la Razón, Collaborative drawing with Andrea Crews for Localismos, Mexico City, Mexico
San Valentín Señorial, audio installation, Hotel Señorial, Mexico City, Mexico

2003
Painting show, Woods Gerry Gallery, Providence, Rhode Island, USA
Fresh (Wall drawings), Carr Haus Gallery, Providence, Rhode Island, USA

2001
YIA (Young International Artists), Centro Culturale Rialto Santo Ambrogio, Rome, Italy
Winter and Spring Exhibitions, Palazzo Cenci, Rome, Italy

Residencies

2015
Monteverdi Tuscany, Castiglioncello de Trinoro, Italy

Catalogue publications

Sin techo esta pelon, Colección Jumex exhibition catalogue, 2010
Creencias Cotidianas, Exhibition catalogue, 2008
Morir de Amor, Exhibition catalogue, 2005

Awards

2008
Nominated for The Paul Hamlyn Award, London, UK

2001
European Honours Program, Palazzo Cenci, Rome, Italy