Material

Shoe parts

By

Made in ,

Circular 255 Recycled 151 Fabric 4 Leather 3 Rubber 3 Thread 4

Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts
Shoe parts

Photos: NadiA

sCUM

"Xipe / Totem for the Capitalocene

A dismantled pair of Nike and Dr. Martens shoes: personal objects bearing the markings of the use they have been subjected to. By displaying these parts, stains and impressions are revealed to be read and interpreted in an exercise that doesn’t consider them dirty, just natural.

These objects help explore ideas of social class and prejudices associated with specific shoe models: gang violence in El Salvador and the working class in England (to mention a few). The social processes that intersect in cultural objects such as shoes are entangled with the personal stories of the wearer's life. Also, they help understand the mass production of basic needs and problematise notions of symmetry and the human body as an index of a contemporary predominant system.

By arranging the shoe parts in specific compositions, these installations become a species of totems or fetishes where to project different interpretations, a kind of consumerist Rorschach test. They also take the form of an exhibited archaeological piece from a time yet to pass."

Making process

"What began as an environmentally conscious project and a softer and kinder way of being an artist in these times, became an intimate political practice focused on the body and its limits as a self-sufficient and fertile territory for creation. Initially intended to be a commentary on the current political and environmental emergency, this project led the artist to focus on her biological and expanded bodies and the objects in direct contact with her. This way, the artist is represented as an active agent of the current environmental crisis, not just a spectator or commentator.

At the Gasworks residency in 2024, following ordinary ritualistic premises, NadiA began to collect materials produced by her body and discarded personal objects: dirt, hair, nails, dead skin, shoe parts, clothes, phone parts, etc. From this accumulation or hoarding, she initiated a slow plastic exploration to generate elements for her drag practice: extensions of her body created or intervened by her own body."

Text submitted by the maker and edited by the Future Materials Bank. For information about reproducing (a part of) this text, please contact the maker.

Ingredients

Leather, rubber, fabric, thread

Credits

Gasworks, The Shelagh Wakely Bequest administered by The Elephant Trust