“Deep in the core there is something similar in all of us.”

Paola Pivi

Paola Pivi (b. 1971, Italy)

Paola Pivi is an Italian multimedia artist who lives and works in India. Pivi is

widely known for creating interactive site-specific installations, many of which are

temporary and in unexpected public spaces. In 1999, she received the Golden

Lion Award at the Venice Biennale.

Pivi use a variety of media—such as photography, sculpture, performance and

public interventions, at times involving live animals and people—to explore

issues of art, image, representation, and knowledge production. Her works,

which are mostly collaborative and context-based, reposition the artist as an

agent and/or researcher who invents forms that constantly renegotiate art as a

critical project. Her works embrace a strong sense of aesthetics that is

immediately impactful, while her inspiration and content remain more hidden,

requiring careful thought to emerge for the viewer. Her works are easily relatable

to a general audience but have deep undertones that force the art spectator to

think and respond.

When the artist speaks of her own work, there is a sense of humility, aloofness,

and nonchalance; however, she is deeply invested in every detail of their

execution. Rather than telling viewers how they should think and feel, Pivi invites

the viewers to come to their own conclusions about her work. Her titles are

typically whimsical and absurd, much like her work, but are touchstones,

windows into her personal psyche.