Portrait of t.

About the work

My work Portrait of t. began as a digital file: a 3D scan of New York musician and performance artist tiger west. Using ZBrush and other sculpting programs, I spent months editing and sculpting the 3D file, and the work was then 3D printed in plastic and cast in bronze, before final finishing with nickel plate.

I asked tiger to describe the piece in their own words. They write “tiger presents their body as a divided subject, marked by the collision of cancer and a trans identity. The portrait reveals a truth in embodiment, fragmented parts sculpted into being.” Portrait of t. is drawn from a larger series of 3D scanned, sculptural portraits of people who have undergone life-altering physical transformations of all kinds - pregnancy, accident and injury, illness, ageing, body modifications, and gender transition and affirming surgeries. My work depicts individuals who often seem caught in private moments of reflection or reverie. Even though they are fragmented by technology, their gestures still read as emotional and very human. The gaps and holes allow the viewer to see the river and the city framed through the figure’s body.

I’m interested in the ways in which our private lives are lived in public – either literally (especially during 2020 and 2021 when much of our social lives moved outdoors) or figuratively (in the public spaces of the internet.) Locating these figures in the public space with minimal narrative offers viewers the opportunity to encounter them in an intimate way. Many other monuments in the park pay tribute to war heroes; this work depicts an anonymous person who is equally worthy of remembrance.