Mona Hatoum on Giacometti’s ‘Heightened Sense of Isolation’

Mona Hatoum One of my main priorities for the Barbican exhibition was to include a cage. It’s a recurring motif in my practice, and I admire the way Giacometti creates cages through simple outlines. I first became aware of his work in the early 1980s, while reading Georges Bataille. I found a small notebook from years later, with a drawing I’d made of The Cage (1950–51) – the very one that’s now in this exhibition – which I saw in a retrospective at Kunsthalle Wien in 1996. While visiting the Fondation Giacometti, I selected The Nose (1947) for the show, because I had the crazy idea of removing it from its cage – which is like an open frame – and hanging it inside Cube (2006), one of my own cages. Cube is constructed of thick, wrought-iron bars, like those on the windows of medieval buildings or prisons, with no way in or out. By putting The Nose inside Cube, it amplifies the expression of horror on the sculpture’s face, evoking the impact of confinement and isolation. Normally, I’d have a structure and leave the viewer to imagine what could be taking place inside, but here I was being opportunistic, and I took advantage of the sculpture’s expression of angst. At first, the Fondation said, ‘No, we have to respect the fact this work exists in its own cage’, but I was pleased that they later accepted the idea.

One of the new works I’ve made for the exhibition is Untitled (cage) (2025). I used steel reinforcement bars to create the outline of a cage, similar to the way in which Giacometti delineates space. It is roughly the size of a human head. I was thinking about psychological entrapment and the limitations placed on our imagination to make us conform. I experimented with putting a few different things inside it, but nothing worked. I almost abandoned it, then found a piece of hand-blown red glass that had been in the studio since 2012. The two elements are very different – a smooth, shiny, fragile form juxtaposed with the harsh, rough metal bars. Although the red shape is only a blob of glass, it looks like a lacerated body part, inside a rebar cage. I often rely on happy accidents, as in the coming together of these two elements. Untitled (cage) is displayed in a cabinet with Giacometti’s Head Skull (1934).

The Barbican’s new gallery is quite intimate, with a low ceiling and dimensions that are close to a domestic space. It’s the perfect place to show Interior Landscape (2008) and Remains of the Day (2016–18) – both room-sized installations of altered domestic furniture – and Incommunicado (1993) continues that theme. Round and Round (2006), a circle of soldiers on top of a bronze side table, has a rapport with Giacometti’s Four Figurines on a Stand (1950). Divide (2025) is actually the first and largest work I made for the exhibition, developed in response to the setting. I visualized a fence or barrier cutting through the space; it still allows a view of the pond, fountains and greenery beyond, but filters it through something that denotes restriction and containment. Divide later evolved into a medical screen on wheels; I replaced the cloth panels with a grid of barbed wire, so it became like a mobile border. My work often introduces an element of threat, implies impending disaster or portrays its aftermath in the domestic sphere.

For me, the most important sculpture by Giacometti that I am including is Woman with Her Throat Cut (1932), a contorted, dismembered, surreal creature. It suggests the scene of a crime, but its abstraction distances it from pure horror. My work Untitled (meat grinder) (2005) makes an oblique reference to this piece. Meat grinder is a bronze cast of a utensil, similar to one in my family’s kitchen when I was growing up. As a child, it was something I regarded with total dread. My mother warned me not to go near it, not to put my little fingers inside or turn the handle. She used it to mince meat, which to me looked like flesh. The object’s implied violence gives it an affinity with Woman with Her Throat Cut. I stay away from representing atrocities, because we’re assaulted by images of horror every day. My strategy is to create an undercurrent of violence, and viewers can complete the narrative by bringing their own interpretations. 

Often, I use the language of minimalism and geometry, with no predetermined readings. Any associations people make come from their own experience. Sometimes, I like to contradict and deflate heavy issues with elements of humour. Roadworks (1985) – a video in which I walk barefoot through Brixton, south London, dragging a pair of Dr. Martens boots – references the police presence there, but it’s funny as well. Last October, when I visited the foundation and the warehouse where Giacometti’s sculptures are stored, I saw several tiny maquettes of walking figures, exquisitely made. Roadworks creates a dialogue with Giacometti’s walking figures, like Figurine Between Two Houses (1950), an isolated female figure that appears threatened by the urban buildings to each side.

Giacometti’s central themes are more relevant today than ever before. I think we’re experiencing a heightened sense of isolation, alienation, vulnerability and uncertainty. It seems the whole world has been turned upside down. Everything is so polarized. In the original version of Hot Spot (2006), I depicted the whole world as a conflict zone. But the conflict is now much worse and more widespread. However, I like my work to remain ambiguous and open to multiple interpretations. Rather than showing graphic violence, I create objects and environments that suggest danger, but leave individuals to imagine the disaster for themselves.

Encounters: Giacometti x Mona Hatoum’ is on view at Barbican Art Gallery, London, until 11 January 2026.

Further Information

Frieze London and Frieze Masters, The Regent’s Park, 15 – 19 October 2025. 

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^{Main image: Mona Hatoum, Remains of the Day, 2016–2018. Photo by: Jo Underhill. ‘Encounters: Giacometti x Mona Hatoum’ (installation view), Barbican Art Gallery, London} 

^{Thumbnail image: Mona Hatoum, Divide, 2025. Photo: Theo Christellis. Courtesy: the artist and White Cube, London, New York, Hong Kong, Paris and Seoul}