The Social Life of Things

Nina Beier was born in Aarhus, Denmark, in 1975, and now lives in Copenhagen. She grew up in Denmark but spent her early childhood in Mozambique. In 2002, she moved to London to complete her studies at the Royal College of Art. After graduating, she lived for periods in Paris, New York, and Berlin. For over fifteen years, in her artistic practice she has been exploring the intersection of sculpture and performance.

Beier works with found materials and poses questions of value, origin, reproduction, and shifting meanings. In her sculptures and installations, she addresses global production and circulation processes by means of unexpected combinations. All her works involve a thematic, symbolic, and representational duality. She creates juxtapositions, sharpens perception, and creates dialogues between the many meanings inherent in the objects she incorporates. Tensions thus arise between original and copy, and value and worthlessness. In her exhibitions, the objects assume shifting identities as sculptures, accessories, or consumer goods. The meaning of the performance works is developed fluidly, in a processual manner. Beier’s practice thus continually questions the mechanisms of reproduction, exchange, and cultural attribution.

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