Nicole Colombo’s domestic and large-scale sculptures and installations create a tension in the space and in the observer as they possess a sort of living energy, while the chosen materials and their combination result to be at the same time libidinal and repulsive. An anthropological approach stands at the core of her research: the artist observes the dichotomies that often characterize the western societies and the difficulty of the human being to accept their co-existence. Leveraging our common imaginary, her attempt gives back to the observer artworks that represent the duality of things, creating abstract characters that portrait each of us. In 2024 Colombo took part into MayDay Everyday, a group show with Olivia Erlanger, Sylvie Fleury and I.W. Payne at Triangolo Gallery, Cremona. In 2023 Colombo took part in Cremona Art Week curated by Rossella Farinotti. In 2022 both solo shows, such as Shifting Balance at 9th French Place, London, and group exhibitions, as , Towards the Pillars of Hercules presented by Boscolo Collection Art Programme. In 2022 Colombo gained MMAT Aquisition Prize 2022 (residency hosted by Kupfer Project, London). In 2021 Colombo participated to another art residency in Nord Resine, curated by Ultravioletto, which ended as a solo show. She also was part of group shows, such as Fluid Shapes (Tube Culture Hall, Milano), Avalanche (Regatta, Düsseldorf), Over and Above (Drina Gallery, Belgrade).

I have crossed the doors of Triangolo many times before this visit, but when I ventured inside to admire the Mayday Everyday exhibition, I sensed a different atmosphere. Each step felt like a journey into raw intimacy, a world cloaked in a pervasive calmness and imbued with domestic meanings. I traversed the exhibition halls with a slow sense of fulfillment, pausing particularly to contemplate Nicole's works, which delicately accompanied me through the entire space. It was Leonardo, the founder of Triangolo, who introduced me to Nicole's work a year ago in Paris, during a quiet Sunday lunch among friends in the Marais. He showed me one of her pieces, and I was deeply struck by the meticulous use of hair in various forms. Shortly after experiencing MayDay Everyday, Nicole invited me to her studio and home. Once again, I felt that intense sense of intimacy that had captivated me during the exhibition visit, engaging me profoundly in her art. It is from this intimate connection and a sense of unabashed privacy that I would like to begin this conversation with the artist.

When I visited your studio, I immediately shared with you the feeling of being at home and the profound intimate connection I perceived with your works. What does it mean for you to work with hair, a symbol laden with meanings, both desired and rejected? Your art transforms the mundane into something extraordinary, seductive, and simultaneously unsettling and out of context.

I believe that the daily reflects what humans are made of, dualisms. The daily is seductive and reluctant, it must maintain a balance to prevent everything from falling apart. Hair is an element we deal with daily: it identifies us when we think of it as an aesthetic element of a human being, but when we decontextualize it and place it, for example, in a sink, stuck in the shower drain or in a brush, or even worse inside food, it takes on a completely different meaning. A subtle and naively fragile element, actually durable and strong, resistant to time. I like the idea of working with everyday elements, recognizable, with which we already have a relationship and trying to subvert their dynamics.

Your studio is located near Via Padova in Milan, a multicultural and chaotic neighborhood, yet rich in its uniqueness. When I arrived from the countryside in my car, I parked and waited for Donald, the Editor in Chief of Coeval, while revisiting your works on my iPhone. I was truly curious to see some of them in person, as I had never had the opportunity. When you welcomed us into your home, which also serves as an artistic studio, I felt a stark contrast to the chaos of the street just left behind. Your studio is impeccable, orderly, and every detail seems carefully considered and desired, just like your works: everything is meticulously curated and researched. One story that particularly struck me is that behind your jewel works. Could you tell us again about their history and origin?

Oh yes, of course haha! We'll call it 'Niki and the discovery of water chestnut seeds'. It all started one evening when I finished working late in the studio. Having not had dinner and with the fridge completely empty, I opted for a delivery. I immediately chose a Chinese restaurant and consulting the menu, I found a dish based on water chestnuts. Curious, I did a brief search on Google and finally saw what they were. I was immediately fascinated by their shape, organic, sinuous but pointed, of a very dark brown, almost black. I delved further into the research and of course discovered that I was not the only one nor the first to be fascinated by them. Witches used them in their rituals or as charms, the Jesuits made rosaries out of them. Two examples in antithesis to each other but united by the same profound fascination for the shape. So I decided it was a perfect element to work with and to include in my work. First as "jewelry" for some wall pieces, then through bronze castings where as the seed expands, the form loses detail in favor of greater sinuosity, in search of a formal synthesis that tells the fascination for this element. Finally, for MayDay Everyday, the ongoing exhibition at Triangolo gallery curated by Rossella Farinotti, I decided to create real silver rings that Ludovica (gallery director) and I wore at the opening.

During our meeting, you confided in me that you have been working at HangarBicocca for several years, and how this has profoundly influenced your artistic approach. An approach that I would describe as rich and meticulous, but above all characterized by a great awareness of space. How has your work at Hangar influenced your personal artistic style and, consequently, the arrangement of your works in exhibition spaces?

I have been working within the vast and complex spaces of HangarBicocca for seven years, and throughout this time, I have tried countless times to imagine works that could support the weight of that space; gradually, you begin to remove mental barriers dictated by the relationship one daily has with enclosed spaces, somehow always "limited," which we are used to living in. You start to imagine on a larger scale, with different architectural structures and consequently the different possible approaches to the work. Furthermore, you work closely with incredible artists and see all the dynamics that exist behind an exhibition; a sort of window into where the works, after leaving their studio, end up, how they are moved, handled, and the works installed. All this gives me a much broader perspective and helps me think of solutions that somehow simplify everyone's work and preserve the work at its best. I believe I have internalized all of this within my practice as a keen eye on the spaces in which I insert myself and with which I want to have a dialogue, even if only with a small detail.

In the MayDay Everyday exhibition, your works were the starting point of the entire exposition. The whole exhibition is an immersive journey into your story and that of other artists. Upon entering, on the left, we find your jewel works "Mother, Daughter, Goddess" (2024) and the brush "Nausicaa is a punk rocker" (2024), the latter specifically created for the event. What was the inspiration behind this particular brush? Was the choice of red hair color intentional or did it hold a specific meaning?

In recent years, I have learned a fundamental pattern within my research; in the attempt to maintain linearity, occasionally the intuition for something different happens. So, I produce in my mind the image of a work that is still too germinal to insert at the point where I have arrived, and so it remains there, sedimenting. These germinal images cyclically return, maybe after one, two, three years, and at that point, they work. 'Nausicaa is a punk rocker' was born as a drawing. I participated in a very nice project curated by Rossella Farinotti and Gianmaria Biancuzzi titled Colouring Book, a collection of 150 drawings by contemporary artists, and one of the proposals I made was the brush. We then decided to discard it. In the meantime, I gave shape to one of the characters I am most attached to, Nausicaa, a white whip with red hair, a punk girl with a romantic soul. From there, finally the need to really make the brush, from the drawing to the oversized clay sculpture you encountered in the gallery. The brush is an object that belongs to Nausicaa, it is her brush, so there had to be red hair trapped between the teeth.

Other distinctive elements of your work are undoubtedly the whips, leather, and latex, which inevitably evoke the world of sex and BDSM. How important is it for you to attribute a clear sexual reference in your works? Is it merely an aesthetic matter or an integral part of the creative process?

Both things. I believe I have a very high fetishism towards materials; often they are the starting point for the realization of a work. I am an aesthete, and the materials and colors that fall within the BDSM imagery terribly fascinate me. That said, this is not the reason why these types of references exist within my practice. As I mentioned at the beginning of this dialogue, dualisms (and not dichotomies) are what interests me to research, investigate, and show. The idea of role play, of exchanging mutual vulnerabilities in order to delve deeper into the human soul, trying to free it from the socio-cultural structure with which each person is imbued. BDSM interests me as a metaphor for all of this. Under the acronym BDSM, a whole series of practices are encompassed where reversing roles and power games, seeking pleasure through pain, investigating kinks related to various traumas, becomes pivotal. Here, the human being puts himself back into play, deeply investigates himself. Think of Dominant and Submissive, at first glance, the one holding the whip seems to have control over the one on all fours on the floor, but the reality is exactly the opposite: the Submissive has power over everything, demands a series of practices from you, and decides when to end the session; after all, it's him who truly dominates.

During our pleasant conversation, you also told me about your work for the Cremona Art Week 2023, which stood out for its provocative installation inside the Diocesan Museum of Cremona. The installation, titled "The Burned (Entropic Dance)," mainly consisted of whips arranged on a spiral staircase within a sacred space. How was it for you to work in such an unusual space and to give your works perhaps a more profane meaning, considering the context in which they were placed?

It was incredible. As I was telling you, I wasn't sure if the Diocesi had understood the meaning of the work until I installed everything; at that point, it was there, it was real, I had to believe in it by force. I will forever be grateful to Rossella Farinotti, the curator of the Cremona Art Week, for giving me the opportunity to realize such a project. My intention was not to criticize a system, but rather to make visible a sort of awakening. Whether we like it or not, as Italians, we are born imbued with a culture where the values of Catholicism continue to remain present, where dichotomies reign. In my attempt to bring dichotomy to dualism, what better place than the museum to present a new version of Thirteen, the black whip. Born as one of the first characters I created, Thirteen has appeared in various contexts. Here, I wanted to somehow represent it in a moment of ascent (or descent), an awakening; raising your eyes, the skylight of the museum allows you to see the sky, lowering them, Lilith, the work I decided to put in dialogue with The Burned (Entropic Dance), welcomes you among its coils.

Living a moment of intimacy within your home and studio was profoundly engaging for me. Witnessing an artist capable of sharing intimate details behind their work is always a privilege and a deeply valuable experience for those who love and study art. I would like to conclude this interview by asking you to unveil the story behind the artwork "Sleeping is for Billionaires" (2022), as from what I have observed of your persona and your work, it perfectly encapsulates your working method and your ability to draw inspiration from your personal story and the environment surrounding you.

Sleeping is for Billionaires is composed of different elements and materials: a sort of shelf and a one-leg pedestal made in iron and three ceramic lanterns inside which essential oil drops are placed. There are different temperatures resulting from the combination of these materials. The title comes from a tattoo I saw a few years ago, on the arm of an art handler I worked with; I found it brilliant and told him I would use it as the title of a work sooner or later, and so it was. The element of the shelf and pedestal reproduces hands, a shape I have used a lot in my work and that has characterized it over time, in an attempt to bring the work back to the human, despite the coldness of the iron they are made of; they support, protect, offer, like a small altar of a personal ritual. The three lanterns, symbols of light and fire, diffuse a mix of two specific essences: lavender and patchouli. In aromatherapy, the two fragrances are used against anxiety and stress, as if they were mild tranquilizers; in addition, patchouli is indicated in psychoenergetic olfactotherapy to strengthen the will to remain faithful to one's beliefs and to counteract lack of self- confidence. Moreover, in popular culture especially in the 1960s-70s and then in the 1980s, it is associated with hippies, rebels. My father has always worn it and still does, just as the scent of lavender brings memories of my grandmother's house to mind. In short, Sleeping is for Billionaires is a layering of personal and non-personal stories and aesthetics that wants to talk about a past present and a future past. I am happy to conclude this lovely conversation talking about this work, and it fills my heart with joy to perceive how much it has resonated with you. Thank you for listening.