Teresa Margolles

Born 1963, Culiacan, Sinaloa, Mexico. Lives and works in Mexico City.

‘Death,’ the proverb has it, ‘is the great leveller.’ Teresa Margolles disagrees: her work shows that, on the contrary, the ways in which people die, and particularly what happens to their bodies after they die, are just as much determined by social and economic factors as our lives are. From her first-hand observations of what happens to the bodies (often anonymous victims of violent crime) brought to the Mexico City morgue, Margolles has developed thought-provoking, often beautiful, sculptures that draw us in, and make us think. For International 06, she will be showing two pieces: one at Tate Liverpool, the other embedded in the street in the heart of Liverpool’s club-land. Both use seductive aesthetics to prompt us to think about the darker aspects of life in cities around the world.

1995 Diploma in forensic medicine and science of communication at Universidad Nacional de México.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2006 Teresa Margolles, Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen, Düsseldorf, Germany

2005 Detonantes, Espacio OPA, City of Guadalajara, Mexico
Ciudad Juárez, Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zurich, Switzerland

2004 Teresa Margolles. Muerte sin fin, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany

2003 Crematorio, Galeria Enrique Guerrero, Mexico City, Mexico
Teresa Margolles, Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zurich, Switzerland
Das Leichentuch, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, Austria

2002 Fin, La Panaderia, Mexico City, Mexico, 14 August
Aire, Art Palace, Madrid, Spain, October

2001 Vaporización, ACE Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico, November

2000 Lienzo, Espacio Contexto, Guatemala City, Guatemala
Bondaje, Kunsthaus Santa Fe, San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, Mexico

Selected Group Exhibitions

2006 Certain Encounters, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

2005 9th Baltic Triennial of International Art, CAC, Vilnius, Lithuania
Eco: Arte Contemporáneo Mexicano, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain
Murmur, International Film Festival of Rotterdam/TENT, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

2004 A Grain of Dust a Drop of Water, Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, South Korea
Made in Mexico, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA, USA

2003 Mercosur, Puerto Alegre, Brazil
Göteborgs Internationella Konstbiennal, Gothenburg, Sweden

2002 Mexico City: An Exhibition about the Exchange Rates of Bodies and Values, Kunst-Werke, Berlin/P.S.1, Long Island City, NY, USA
20 Million Mexicans Can’t be Wrong, South London Gallery, London, UK

2001 Escultura Mexicana, Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, Mexico

2000 Extramuros, Bienal de La Habana, Havana, Cuba, curated by Taiyana Pimentel, October
Exotismos, IV Biennale de Lyon, Lyons, France, curated by Jean H. Martín

Further Reading

Pascal Beause, ‘Teresa Margolles’, Flash Art (Milan) (July–September 2005), pp. 106–9

Rubén Gallo, ‘Teresa Margolles’, in Cream 3, London: Phaidon Press, 2003, pp. 212–15

Udo Kittelmann and Klaus Görner, Teresa Margolles. Muerte sin fin, Frankfurt: Museum für Moderne Kunst, 2004

Gerald Matt et al., Teresa Margolles, Vienna: Kunsthalle Wien, Project Space, 2003, No. 01

Mexico City: An Exhibition about the Exchange Rates of Bodies and Values, exh. cat., New York: P.S.1/Berlin: Kunst-Werke, 2002