Nina Beier, »Crybaby«, 2019

Crybaby, 2019

Foot-scrub pumice stone, faux gemstone earrings
Approx. 8 x 7 x 5 cm
Edition of 30 + 5 AP, each unique, signed and numbered on cardboard box

Nina Beier (*1975, Denmark) has developed her own lexicon to negotiate the shifting relationship between objects, representation, and value in our image-saturated world. Juxtaposing and repurposing the languages of advertising, stock photography, and art history, she lets the artwork itself turn into a moving target that flips between image and idea and meme. 

In this edition for Spike, Beier has inserted a pair of fake diamond earrings into the holes of a pumice stone. The title of the work, Crybaby, suggests it’s a face, morose even with its sparkling eyes, but at the same time it’s a surrealist image or a conceptual sculpture that makes one wonder about the relationship between its constituent parts: where is it that volcanic lava meets the world of commodity production, geology meets (imitation) jewellery? 

Solo shows include Highline commission, New York (2022); Palace Enterprise, Copenhagen (2021); PAOS GDL, Guadalajara (2020); Kunsthal Gent, Croy Nielsen, Vienna (both 2019), and Metro Pictures, New York, Kunstverein München (both 2018). Nina Beier lives in Copenhagen. 

Read Nina Beier’s Artist’s Favourites in Issue #48, available here.