© Teresa Margolles / courtesy of the artist and James Cohan, New York
On view
Cross-Collections Gallery
El manto negro (The Black Shroud),
2020
Teresa Margolles, born 1963, Culiacán, Mexico; active Mexico City, Mexico
2020-340.1-.1600
“Every tile, every fragment, could symbolically represent the body of a murdered person,” Margolles stated about El manto negro’s 1,600 ceramic squares during a talk in 2022 at the Princeton University Art Museum. Margolles created the tiles in collaboration
with the renowned ceramicists of Mata Ortiz, a village in Chihuahua, Mexico, to memorialize the people murdered due to drug trade and cartel violence in this region near the US-Mexico border. With her work, Margolles seeks to call attention to the responsibility that Mexico and the United States shared for this violence—the cartels operate in Mexico, while their weapons are produced in the United States. As the artist explains, “The wall becomes a unifying shroud that covers both countries.”
with the renowned ceramicists of Mata Ortiz, a village in Chihuahua, Mexico, to memorialize the people murdered due to drug trade and cartel violence in this region near the US-Mexico border. With her work, Margolles seeks to call attention to the responsibility that Mexico and the United States shared for this violence—the cartels operate in Mexico, while their weapons are produced in the United States. As the artist explains, “The wall becomes a unifying shroud that covers both countries.”
More About This Object
Information
Title
El manto negro (The Black Shroud)
Dates
2020
Maker
Medium
Burnished ceramic
Dimensions
each (approximately): 10.5 × 11.1 × 3.5 cm (4 1/8 × 4 3/8 × 1 3/8 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase, Fowler McCormick, Class of 1921, Fund
Object Number
2020-340.1-.1600
Place Made
North America, Mexico, Chihuahua, Mata Ortiz
Culture
Materials
Techniques
Teresa Margolles, Mexico City, Mexico, to; [James Cohan Gallery, New York, New York], sold; to Princeton University Art Museum, 2020.
