Mónica Mays at Blue Velvet Projects

Artist: Mónica Mays

Exhibition title: Buttermilk

Venue: Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich, Switzerland

Date: April 15 – May 27, 2022

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and  Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

In Buttermilk, artist Mónica Mays reprises the use of the unprocessed silkworm cocoon as an analogic refrain. Mays delivers a sculptural variation on taxidermy, exploiting the necessary contradictions of production and preservation as they relate to the generative and ironic pleasures of reproduction.

Pieces of furniture enter Mays’ studio as readymades and emerge as containers. Categories in general become disputable at her hands, as objects dispel into one another. The central sculptural group sees assemblages of salvaged woodwork tangled with “bodies,” each following a unique formal structure. The cast of phallus-like figures is not unambiguous, but also not necessarily anthropomorphic. Wrapped with semi-transparent vellum veils, their fragile guts (which sometimes spill out) constitute wool, feathers, and silkworm cocoons, among other natural (by-)products.

Though most imposing, without icons (2023) does not typify the group, primarily because its containership is symbolic. The tall, cascading thing leans forward slightly as if wanting to step off its tabletop pedestal, creating a silhouette reminiscent of the Virgin of El Rocío, the highly decorated devotional carved wooden statue of the Virgin and Child which becomes the centrepiece of an annual procession in Spain. With no more lists (barren lube machine lithium rusty diamond fertile tar) and spilled milk (both 2023), however, the artist develops on containership literally, forcing the bodies into the furniture; the sculptures seem to simultaneously birth and ingest themselves. Mays then creates anachronisms by leaving obvious sanding marks on the wood and making small scribbles in crayon, not so much imposing on the work as revealing its tactility — leaving a fingerprint.

out of heat (2023) considers the cocoon itself. A compacted body is ironically suspended from a structure of mismatched arms and legs and seats resembling gallows. The crucial moment represented here exists somewhere between birth and death. This birth-death tautology continues with shadow boxes (all 2023), a series of wall-mounted taxonomy drawers. Intended to facilitate empirical and personal classification, Mays puts them to the task somewhere in between:housing cocoons, for safekeeping. Drawn across the front of each box is a fine screen of flower-dyed silk. The same material is the predominant component of false ideals (all 2023), a series of large round canvases stained with botanical material in concentric patterns. Not quite visible from downstairs, but from up close, one sees how the surfaces are scattered with whimsical miniature wooden doors and drawers, suggesting a story within the story of the landscape. Mays sense of formal humour is most apparent with the handmade cowhide balls (balls, 2023) innocuous placed among the furniture-bodies. Ultimately, only the string of children’s chairs above the entrance do not “contain” besides their own meaning (not giving, 2023).

Mays’ complete extraction of her materials presents the paradox of fertility and reproduction within an established figurative language. A lingering air of decay is mistaken for a fecund smell.

— Olamiju Fajemisin

Mónica Mays, Buttermilk, 2023, exhibition view, Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

Mónica Mays, Buttermilk, 2023, exhibition view, Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

Mónica Mays, Buttermilk, 2023, exhibition view, Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

Mónica Mays, Buttermilk, 2023, exhibition view, Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

Mónica Mays, Buttermilk, 2023, exhibition view, Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

Mónica Mays, Buttermilk, 2023, exhibition view, Blue Velvet Projects, Zürich

Mónica Mays, Do not open, 2023, Plants, linen, wood, brass, 136 x 0 x 3.5 cm