Laia Abril
Abril (b. 1986) is a research-based artist, whose work spans photography, text, video and sound to examine the intersections of gender issues, biopolitics and systems of power. Through a politically engaged, process-led practice employing forensic aesthetics and counter-narratives, Abril interrogates dominant histories and the politics of representation, exposing the social and institutional structures that shape lived experience.
For the exhibition, Abril presents a work belonging to her latest project, Endometriosis (2026), a photo-sculpture featuring the fragmented body of a woman living with disabling pain, portrayed in a moment of relief and dissociation. Varnished with the artist's own tears—Abril herself lives with the condition—the piece exposes the historical continuity between the pathologisation of women’s bodies and the persistent dismissal of pain, revealing how medicine has often functioned as a mechanism of control rather than care in the field of sexual and reproductive health.
Abril is the author of several acclaimed publications, including her ongoing series A History of Misogyny, which includes On Abortion, On Rape and On Mass Hysteria. Her work has been exhibited internationally and is held in collections including Centre Pompidou, Museo Reina Sofía, MACBA, Photo Elysée, Fotomuseum Winterthur and the V&A. She has received the Foam Paul Huf Award (Amsterdam), RPS Hood Medal (London), Aperture Best Book Award (NY/Paris), and Spain’s National Photography Award. Abril is represented by Les Filles du Calvaire, Paris and Set Espai d’Art, Valencia.