Monica Piloni (Curitiba, PR, Brazil, 1978) lives and works in Brussels, Belgium. A graduate of the Escola de Música e Belas Artes do Paraná (EMBAP, 2002), she is currently pursuing a master's degree in Sculpture at the École nationale supérieure des arts visuels de La Cambre (Brussels, 2025). Her work spans sculpture, objects and photography, taking the female body as an artistic medium subject to processes of mirroring, dismemberment and multiplication.
Her work investigates the sexualization of the female figure through a critical dialogue with the tradition of figurative sculpture. Since the beginning of her career, she has used her own body as a model to produce life-casting molds, lending her measurements and silhouette to the figures she creates. This gesture, rooted in self-portraiture, expanded into a symbolic portrait of women's experience more broadly. Her sculptures reconfigure human anatomy through limbs that are removed or duplicated, faces that disappear, and legs that multiply threefold to support bodies turning upon themselves. A satin automotive paint finish, industrial-textured skin and synthetic hair reinforce the figures' deliberate artificiality.
Piloni pursues the aesthetic and conceptual objective of attaining the Freudian unheimlich, a condition that is both familiar and unsettling and capable of provoking repulsion and fascination in the viewer. The morbid quality of her work casts a haze over the nude bodies, which appear in imposing poses and with an unsettling sensuality.
Her solo exhibitions include Humanas, demasiado humanas at Zipper Galeria (São Paulo, 2022); Ciclo at Zipper Galeria (São Paulo, 2019); Simetrias Dissidentes at the Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Sorocaba (2022); and Allegories of Triversity at Galerie Met (Berlin, 2024).
She has participated in group exhibitions such as MEME, no Br@asil da memeficação on the CCBB tour (São Paulo, Brasília, Belo Horizonte and Rio de Janeiro, 2025); Corpos explícitos, corpos ocultos at the Pinacoteca do Ceará (Fortaleza, 2025); and Bienal TRIO at the Museu Nacional de Belas Artes (Rio de Janeiro, 2015). Internationally, she has participated in Présence at the Hôtel Boël (Brussels, 2026); 19 Travaux / 19 Incidents at the Botanique (Brussels, 2026); Non-Functional Anatomies at the Highnumbers Gallery (Brussels, 2025); K1 & K2 at the WARP Contemporary Art Platform (Sint-Niklaas, Belgium, 2025); Ghost in the Shell at Glue (Berlin, 2025); Clairvoyance at Guy Hepner Gallery (New York, 2016); SEASON S 2 at the Imaginair Art Space (Brussels, 2025); STARTERS & MASTERS at Kunstenplatform WARP (Sint-Niklaas, 2025); Female Gaze at Galeria Artcrush (Brussels, 2024); and Embassy of Food at Dutch Design Week (Eindhoven, 2017).
Her awards include an Honorable Mention at the Bienal do Triângulo Mineiro (Uberlândia, 2007), the 4th Prêmio Philips de Artes para Jovens Talentos (MASP, 1997) and the 2nd Prêmio da EMBAP (1997). Her work is held in collections including MAC Niterói (Coleção João Sattamini), the Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Sorocaba (MACS), the Instituto Figueiredo Ferraz, Kunstenplatform WARP (Sint-Niklaas) and Casa Caus (Lisbon).