Image by Helen Korpak
Gladys Camilo (she/her) is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice centres on sustainability
and the natural world. Camilo’s work investigates how care—both as a labour and a material—shapes
personal and collective identities.
Her work is guided by an intuitive and emotive approach, often incorporating upcycled materials
and natural dyes. In addition to her visual art, Camilo is a cultural worker and DJ whose projects
foster reflection and dialogue around care, identity, and collective well-being.
She is currently a member of Feminist Culture House ry and MYÖS ry.
I create from the spaces in between.
Art, for me, is a form of care—care for the self, for community, and the natural world.
I approach my practice as both emotional and ecological. I use materials that carry stories: oil paint that shifts with my body,
upcycled textiles that hold histories, natural pigments that echo the land. My process is intuitive, driven by emotion and observation,
and guided by the belief that materials, like people, remember.
I collect. I archive. I reimagine.
Flea market finds, online relics, family photographs—these fragments serve as starting points. Through them, I explore forgotten feelings
and reassemble memories into new realities. My work is not about nostalgia, but about transformation—taking what was and shaping it into what could be.
My figures are dreamlike and intentionally distorted.
I strip away the excess to reach emotional truth. In doing so, I allow space for interpretation, ambiguity, and feeling.
I consider mothering—both literal and metaphorical—as a central force in my work: a source of creation, trauma, healing, and generational continuity.
My textile sculptures and paintings act as carriers of these layered narratives, holding both tenderness and weight.
My art is a living record of care, trauma and imagination.
It is a conversation with ghosts, a reweaving of identity, and an offering to the future.
