2018

Pant

Tschabalala Self

American, born 1990

Confrontational and sensual, self-possessed though abject, this female figure defiantly gazes at the viewer. A third, yellow appendage protrudes from her body, insinuating a phantom limb and acting as a stand-in for a phallus.

Tschabalala Self dissects and recombines the human body to probe established ideas about gender, and to confront conventions that have shaped representations of black women. Her technique—stitching found fabric onto canvas—invokes associations with clothing as well as female domestic labor. Her title questions the symbolic power of the word "pant," traditionally linked with a male presence but here transferred to a female form.