mariana castillo deball
1975, Mexico City
Mariana Castillo Deball takes a kaleidoscopic approach to her practice, mediating between science, archaeology, and the visual arts and exploring the way in which these disciplines describe the world. Her installations, performances, sculptures, and editorial projects arise from the recombination of different languages that seek to understand the role objects play in our identity and history. Her works result from a long research process, allowing her to study the different ways in which a historical object can be read as it presents a version of reality that informs and blends into a polyphonic panorama. Seeking to initiate a dialogue with institutions and museums beyond contemporary art, she collaborates with ethnographic collections, libraries, and historical archives. She often produces multiples —books or objects with different uses and formats— to explore how they might generate new territories. Weaving her way through the fields of anthropology, philosophy, and literature, Castillo Deball draws inspiration from a wide range of sources as she engages in the exchange of knowledge as a transforming process for everyone involved.
Mariana Castillo Deball earned a BFA from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México in 1997. In 2003, she completed a postgraduate program at Jan van Eyck Academie in the Netherlands. Deball has been awarded with the Prix de Rome (2004), Zurich Art Prize (2012), a fellowship at the Henry Moore Institute (2012), and the Preis der Nationalgalerie für junge Kunst (2013). She was an artist in residency at the Berliner Künstlerprogramm in Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) in 2011.
Mariana Castillo Deball lives and works in Berlin and Mexico City.
mariana castillo deball
cinturones herramientas, 2026
leather, metal, ceramic, aluminum wire, black and golden clay
82 × 132 × 6 cm (32.28 × 51.97 × 2.36 in)
mariana castillo deball
even variation is repetition, 2026
high temperature ceramic with iron glaze
29.5 × 36 cm (11.61 × 14.17 in)
mariana castillo deball
inversions, 2026
animal paws imprint on raked polished concrete
60 × 44 × 5 cm (23.62 × 17.32 × 1.97 in)
mariana castillo deball
singing to its beads, 2025
ceramic
213 x 100 x 40 cm (83 7/8 x 39 3/8 x 15 3/4 in)
mariana castillo deball
calendar fall away 46, 2022
woodcut print on konzo and abaca, handmade paper
181 x 124 cm (71.26 x 48.82 in)
mariana castillo deball
she bends to catch a feather of herself as she falls 25, 2022
paperwork with linocut printing on custom handmade paper
77 x 56 cm (30 1/4 x 22 in)
mariana castillo deball
do ut des pinacoteca vaticana-2021, 2021
drilled book on cedar wooden base
31 x 25 cm (12.2 x 9.84 in)
mariana castillo deball
do ut des, museo de arte de cataluna, 2021
drilled book on cedar wooden base
31 x 25 x 1 cm (12.2 x 9.84 x .39 in)
mariana castillo deball
¿quién medirá el espacio, quién me dirá el momento?, 8 (columna curvas viborita) 2021, 2021
low temperature co-fired ceramic (clay from atzompa, oaxaca), metallic structure (16 pieces)
215 x 50 x 50 cm (84.65 x 19.69 x 19.69 in)
mariana castillo deball
coatlicue (rostros de serpiente), 2021
fiberglass
80 x 170 x 35 cm (31 1/2 x 66 7/8 x 13 3/4 in)
mariana castillo deball
cabeza olmeca san lorenzo 1 (rostro lado derecho), 2021
fiberglass
195 x 101 x 50 cm (76.77 x 39.76 x 19.69 in)
mariana castillo deball
doppelgänger, 2020
set of 3 ceramic vessels made of red stoneware painted with engobe slip
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
all around 11, 2020
one ceramic vessel made of red stoneware painted with engobe slip, hand woven textile dyed with an ikat pattern and displayed with backstrap looms produced in the state of michoacán, mexico by ukata
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
eye, 2016
concrete with wire and plaster
58.4 x 40.6 x 2.5 cm (23 x 16 x 1 in)
mariana castillo deball
there are two sides to the beginning, 2018
concrete tiles, watercolor and ink
38 × 45 cm (14.96 x 17.72 in)
mariana castillo deball
feathered serpent, 2016
concrete, wood, rope
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
hipótesis de un árbol, 2016
56 frottages, ink on japanese paper
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
vista de ojos, 2014
set of 130 pieces, 18 mm plywood plate incised with cnc router
118 x 118 cm (46.46 x 46.46 in)
mariana castillo deball
untitled, 2014
laserchrome print mounted on dibond
180 x 270 cm (70.87 x 106.3 in)
mariana castillo deball
null problemo, 2014
reproduction of a wheelchair with an inscription
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
mschatta fassade, 2014
textile paint on cotton fabric, metal track, audio
550 x 3800 cm (216.54 x 1496.06 in)
mariana castillo deball
hieroglyph storage, 2014
metal structure, 7 white plaster pieces
150 x 150 x 80 cm (59.06 x 59.06 x 31.5 in)
mariana castillo deball
tree trap oaxaca, 2013
paper squeeze, wool, cotton paper
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
photograph of the making of tree trap berlin 2013 and tree trap oaxaca 2012, 2012 – 2013
paper squeeze, wool and cotton paper
mariana castillo deball
what we caught we threw away, what we didn’t catch we kept, 2013
mixed media
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
no acabarán mis flores, 2013
five chinelo costumes, bead embroidery, velvet, feathers, cotton fabric, masks
performance
mariana castillo deball
nuremberg map of tenochtitlan, 2013
woodcut with a cnc router, costumes, embroideries, masks
15 x 9.5 m (590.5 x 374.01 in)
mariana castillo deball
what we caught we threw away, what we didn’t catch we kept, 2013
mixed media
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
uncomfortable objects, 2012
metal structure, papier-mâché, laser prints and aluminum wire
200 x 100 x 50 cm (78.74 x 39.37 x 19.69 in)
mariana castillo deball
uncomfortable objects, 2012
plaster, pigments, stones, shells, masks, fabric, glass, wood, clay, diverse objects mounted on a steel frame
600 x 400 x 300 cm (236.22 x 157.48 x 118.11 in)
mariana castillo deball
there are no spaces in words as people speak them, 2012
acrylic paint on wall
170 x 400 cm (66 7/8 x 157 1/2 in)
mariana castillo deball
mathematical distortions, 2012
plaster, pigments, rabbit glue, aluminum
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
el dónde estoy va desapareciendo, 2011
mariana castillo deball
tropic, why did you give me these hands so full of color? and nadie sabe qué hora es, 2011
site specific installation, papier mâché, aluminium wire, laser prints
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
llke a hundred mirrors, i refl ect your body, 2011
papier mâché, aluminium wire, laser prints, various sizes
300 x 285 x 130 cm (118.1 x 112.2 x 51.2 in)
mariana castillo deball
no solid form can contain you, 2010
modular fiberglass sculpture made from a cast of the original coatlicue statue
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
no solid form can contain you, 2010
modular fiberglass sculpture made from a cast of the original coatlicue statue
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
the stronger the light your shadow cuts deeper, 2009
papercutting
variable dimensions
mariana castillo deball
estas ruinas que ves, 2006
mixed media
variable dimensions
installation view of mariana castillo deball: stringing beads, dortmunder kunstverein, dortmund, 2025. photo: jens franke
installation view of mariana castillo deball: stringing beads, dortmunder kunstverein, dortmund, 2025. photo: jens franke
installation view of mariana castillo deball: stringing beads, dortmunder kunstverein, dortmund, 2025. photo: jens franke
installation views of mariana castillo deball: a noite, as part of to-day project, pivô, são paulo, 2023. photo: everton ballardin
installation views of mariana castillo deball: a noite, as part of to-day project, pivô, são paulo, 2023. photo: everton ballardin
installation views of mariana castillo deball: a noite, as part of to-day project, pivô, são paulo, 2023. photo: everton ballardin
installation view of mariana castillo deball in until the songs spring, 59th venice biennal, 2022. photo: nick ash
installation view of mariana castillo deball in until the songs spring, 59th venice biennal, 2022. photo: nick ash
installation view of mariana castillo deball in until the songs spring, 59th venice biennal, 2022. photo: nick ash
installation view of mariana castillo deball: amarantus, museo universitario arte contemporáneo (muac), mexico city, 2021. photo: oliver santana
installation view of mariana castillo deball: amarantus, museo universitario arte contemporáneo (muac), mexico city, 2021. photo: oliver santana
installation view of mariana castillo deball: amarantus, museo universitario arte contemporáneo (muac), mexico city, 2021. photo: oliver santana
installation view of mariana castillo deball: finding oneself outside, new museum, new york, 2019. photo: maris hutchinson & epw studio
installation view of mariana castillo deball: finding oneself outside, new museum, new york, 2019. photo: maris hutchinson & epw studio
installation view of mariana castillo deball: finding oneself outside, new museum, new york, 2019. photo: maris hutchinson & epw studio
installation view of mariana castillo deball: feathered changes, serpent disappearances, san francisco art institute (sfai), 2016. photo: gregory goode
installation view of mariana castillo deball: feathered changes, serpent disappearances, san francisco art institute (sfai), 2016. photo: gregory goode
installation view of mariana castillo deball: feathered changes, serpent disappearances, san francisco art institute (sfai), 2016. photo: gregory goode
installation view of mariana castillo deball in incerteza viva, 32th são paulo biennal, 2016. photo: leo eloy, estúdio garagem, fundação bienal de são paulo
installation view of mariana castillo deball in incerteza viva, 32th são paulo biennal, 2016. photo: leo eloy, estúdio garagem, fundação bienal de são paulo
installation view of mariana castillo deball in incerteza viva, 32th são paulo biennal, 2016. photo: leo eloy, estúdio garagem, fundação bienal de são paulo
installation view of mariana castillo deball: ¿quién medirá el espacio, quién me dirá el momento?, the high line, new york, 2015. photo: timothy schenck
installation view of mariana castillo deball: ¿quién medirá el espacio, quién me dirá el momento?, the high line, new york, 2015. photo: timothy schenck
installation view of mariana castillo deball: ¿quién medirá el espacio, quién me dirá el momento?, the high line, new york, 2015. photo: timothy schenck
installation view mariana castillo deball: who will measure the space, who will tell me the time?, museo de arte contemporáneo de oaxaca (maco), 2015. courtesy of museo de arte contemporáneo de oaxaca
installation view mariana castillo deball: who will measure the space, who will tell me the time?, museo de arte contemporáneo de oaxaca (maco), 2015. courtesy of museo de arte contemporáneo de oaxaca
installation view mariana castillo deball: who will measure the space, who will tell me the time?, museo de arte contemporáneo de oaxaca (maco), 2015. courtesy of museo de arte contemporáneo de oaxaca
installation view of mariana castillo deball: parergon, hamburger bahnhof, berlin, 2014. courtesy of staatliche museen zu berlin, nationalgalerie. photo: thomas bruns
installation view of mariana castillo deball: parergon, hamburger bahnhof, berlin, 2014. courtesy of staatliche museen zu berlin, nationalgalerie. photo: thomas bruns
installation view of mariana castillo deball: parergon, hamburger bahnhof, berlin, 2014. courtesy of staatliche museen zu berlin, nationalgalerie. photo: thomas bruns
installation view of mariana castillo deball: vista de ojos, kurimanzutto, mexico city, 2014.
installation view of mariana castillo deball: vista de ojos, kurimanzutto, mexico city, 2014.
installation view of mariana castillo deball: vista de ojos, kurimanzutto, mexico city, 2014.
Her major recent solo exhibitions include: Serpent Disappearances, kurimanzutto, New York (2026); Ella es la luna and she lights the darkness, Neues Museum Nuremberg, Germany (2026); Feathered Changes, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) (2026); Stringing Beads, Dortmunder kunstverein, Dortmund, Germany (2025); The Flames Leave a Feathered Mark, ASU Art Museum Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona (2024); TO-DAY / A Noite, PIVÔ Art and Research, São Paulo, Brazil (2023); Luce Dietro Tracce Incompiute, Museo delle Culture di Milano (MUDEC) (2023); Roman Rubbish, London Mithraeum Bloomberg SPACE (2022); In a Convex Mirror, Pinksummer Contemporary Art, Genova, Italy (2022); By the position of your heart IT WILL BE KNOWN WHERE THE MIDDLE PLACE IS, Vleeshal, Middelburg, The Netherlands (2021); Amarantus, Museum für Gegenwartskunst Siegen, Germany (2021); in collaboration with Museo Universitario de Arte Contemporáneo (MUAC), Mexico City (2022); and Museo Artium de Arte Contemporáneo del País Vasco (Artium Museoa), Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain (2022); In Tlili in Tlapalli. Images of the new land: indigenous identity after the conquest, collaboration with Diana Magaloni and Tatiana Falcón Museo Amparo, Puebla, Mexico (2018); Finding Oneself Outside, New Museum, New York (2019); To-Day, February 20th, Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) Museum of Art, Georgia (2018); Pleasures of association, and poissons, such as love, Galerie Wedding, Berlin (2017); Feathered Changes, Serpent Disappearances, Walter and McBean Galleries, San Francisco Art Institute (2016); ¿Quién medirá el espacio, quién me dirá el momento?, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca (MACO), Mexico (2015); Mariana Castillo Deball, Kunsthalle Lissabon, Portugal (2014); Mariana Castillo Deball: Parergon, Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart, Berlin (2014); What we caught we threw away, what we didn’t catch we kept, Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA), Glasgow, United Kingdom (2013); Zurich Art Prize: Uncomfortable Objects, Haus Konstruktiv, Zurich, Switzerland (2012); Este desorden construido, autoriza geológicas sorpresas a la memoria más abandonada, Museo Experimental El Eco, Mexico City (2011); Between You and the Image of You That Reaches Me, Museum of Latin American Art (MOLAA), Long Beach, California (2010); Kaleidoscopic Eye, Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen, Switzerland (2009); Estas ruinas que ves, Museo de Arte Carrillo Gil (MACG), Mexico City (2006); Prix de Rome: Institute of Chance, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2004), among others.
Her work has also been included in numerous group exhibitions, such as: Pre-Architecture, CIVA, Brussels, Belgium (2024); Forgive Us Our Trespasses, Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), Berlin (2024); Tangente, Festival for Contemporary Culture, St. Pölten, Austria (2024); Rituals of Daily Life, Collegium, Avila, Spain (2024); Imaginario Imaginario Coyolxauhqui, Museo Banco de México, Mexico City (2023); Las paradojas del internacionalismo (narradas por la colección del Tamayo) Parte 1, Museo Tamayo, Mexico City (2023); Ceremony (Burial of an Undead World), Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (2022); mixed up with others before we even begin, Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien (MUMOK), Vienna (2022); Who is gazing?, Musée du quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, Paris (2020); Time for Fragments. Works from the Marx Collection and the Collection of the Nationalgalerie, Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart, Berlin (2019); Hello World. Revision einer Sammlung, Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart, Berlin (2018); Statues Also Die: Contemporary reflections on heritage and conflict in the Middle-East, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin, Italy (2018); Lecturas de un territorio fracturado, Museo Amparo, Puebla, Mexico (2017); Alors que j'écoutais moi aussi David, Eleanor, Mariana, etc., La Criée centre d’art contemporain, Rennes, France (2017); El orden Natural de las Cosas, Museo Jumex, Mexico City (2016); Ce qui ne sert pas s’oublie, CAPC musée d'art contemporain de Bordeaux, France (2015); Storylines: Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim Museum, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2014); Arqueológicas, Matadero Centro de Creación Contemporánea, Madrid (2013); Resisting the Present, Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris (2012); Æther – Une proposition de Christoph Keller, Centre Pompidou, Paris (2011); For the blind man in the dark room looking for the black cat that isn’t there, Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), London (2010); The Malady of Writing, Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA), Spain (2009), among others.
She has participated in several biennials such as: Spaces of Possibility, Bruges Triennial, Belgium (2024); Ten Thousand Suns, The 24th Biennale of Sydney, Australia (2024); Sharjah Biennial 13, Tamawuj, United Arab Emirates (2017); dOCUMENTA (14), Athens, Grece and Kassel, Germany (2017); 8 Berlin Biennale (2014); dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel, Germany (2012); 54th Venice Biennale (2011); AB2 HEAVEN 2nd Athens Biennale, Athens (2009); Manifesta 7, Trentino - Alto Adige, Italy (2008); 7th Shanghai Biennale, China (2008), among others.
read the full article on the guardian
read the full interview on apollo magazine
read the full article of the mexican pavillion at the venice biennale on the new york times
"Amarantus" is the first retrospective in Mexico of the work of Mariana Castillo Deball at MUAC, UNAM.
"El tiempo en las cosas" in the Amparo Museum in Puebla presents as part of its permanent Contemporary Art Collection, the work of Damián Ortega, Gabriel Orozco, Abraham Cruzvillegas, Daniel Guzmán, Dr. Lakra, Carlos Amorales, Eduardo Abaroa, Sofia Táboas, Iñaki Bonillas, Mariana Castillo Deball and Minerva Cuevas.
Read the full review on Mariana Castillo Deball's exhibition "Amarantus" at MGK Siegen by Stephanie Bailey for Ocula magazine
The exhibition at MGKSiegen is the first solo presentation in Germany covering the Mexican artist's complete œuvre. Works from the last 15 years are being presented in 14 rooms.
Deball’s exhibition focuses on sharing the stories of a number of little-known female anthropologists and indigenous storytellers and makers.
Listen to the audios by Mariana Castillo Deball and Carlos Sandoval created from the recordings of the actions carried out with local collaborators of Milpa Alta.
Watch the conversation published by America's Society with Mariana Castillo Deball where she talks about her work from her studio in Berlin during Covid-19 quarantine.
For her project at MUMA, Castillo Deball has focused on Nilpena, an area north of Adelaide, which is home to one of the most well-preserved ediacara fossil sites in the world.
This solo exhibition presents three distinct kinds of work—and worlds—created by Castillo Deball in the past decade. They strike a balance between material folds and unfolding ideas, whereby multiple senses of time are experienced in the blank spaces of a drawing, in the negative space of sculpture, or in the wrinkles of a surface. For years, Castillo Deball’s work has consistently manifested the ways in which the passage of time is illustrated, organized, and expressed in nature as much as in artifice.
Deball gives the title Petlacoatl to his first individual exhibition in Chicago, the title comes from taking up the Nahua word that means "mat woven with snakes that point in all directions".
The exhibition gathers colonial codices from the Biblioteca Nacional de Antropología e Historia (National Library of Anthropology and History) and map-paintings from the Archivo General de la Nación (General Archive of the Nation), together with the encyclopedic project known as the Florentine Codex housed in the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, in Florence, Italy. Together, the documents examine the indigenous point of view on the conquest and the processes of survival, negotiation, and creation of a new land.
For her exhibition at the SCAD Museum of Art, Castillo Deball presents the most recent iteration of the project "To-Day," which combines historical research about a specific site and a physical form that contains this research, which the artist calls a "fictional character."
The starting point for the artist’s work is her enthusiasm for fossils and their association with lithography as well as the change in evolutionary research during technical development. Mariana Castillo Deball’s Pleasures of Association, and Poissons, such as Love thematizes the rivalry between different techniques for creating scientific »facts«, each showing a different view of Evolution.
