Fitting Room

Empty retail space, Whanganui, New Zealand, 2021

Fitting Room is installed within an abandoned retail fitting room in Whanganui as part of Symplegma, a wider project developed for Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery that explores the close entwinement of local queer communities as a complex and interconnected whole. At its centre, a large mirrored structure lies on the floor between cubicles, its surface scattered with rose petals, each holding a small white tablet suggestive of pharmaceutical care and emotional management. The horizontal mirror asks viewers to look down and encounter their own reflection, evoking vulnerability and self-scrutiny within gendered retail spaces. Inside the fitting rooms, accessory stands form V-shaped structures containing photographs of Whanganui’s sky, some marked with sequences of X’s and Y’s referencing gender classification. These contained arrangements suggest temporary sanctuaries, moments of private experimentation and possibility for queer bodies navigating spaces shaped by binary norms.