In this episode of Broken Boxes we hear recurring host and artist Cannupa Hanska Luger in conversation with Cassils, a transgender artist who makes their own body the material and protagonist of their performances. Cassils’s art contemplates the history(s) of LGBTQI+ violence, representation, struggle and survival. For Cassils, performance is a form of social sculpture: Drawing from the idea that bodies are formed in relation to forces of power and social expectations, Cassils’s work investigates historical contexts to examine the present moment.

In the conversation, Cassils speaks to recent and landmark projects including Monument Push, a multi pronged experiential work and reaction to Trans violence, and In Plain Sight, a national activation responding to policed migration and created in collaboration with dozens of artists across the nation. They speak to the larger ideas that shape their practice, including how their work explores the violence, resilience, strength and vulnerability of the body. They unpack the ethos behind their collaboration with other community members, how the audience becomes archive in their practice, and the importance of restructuring systems of care in large projects to actively dismantle the notion that those directly impacted should shoulder the burden alone. They see a desperate need to uplift complexity and productive disagreement to move us forward collectively and share how they exercise this communication model as an educator. Cassils reminds us of the potential of art, that within the space of making, our agency cannot be taken. Cassils ends the conversation reading an excerpt from a powerful essay by James Baldwin regarding the artist's responsibility to ”...drive to the heart of every answer and expose the question that the answer hides.”

Cassils has had recent solo exhibitions at HOME Manchester, Station Museum of Contemporary Art, Perth Institute for Contemporary Arts, Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, NYC; Institute for Contemporary Art, AU; Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts; Bemis Center, Omaha; MU Eindhoven, Netherlands.They are the recipient of the National Creation Fund, a 2020 Fleck Residency from the Banff Center for the Arts, a Princeton Lewis Artist Fellowship finalist, a Villa Bellagio Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship, a United States Artist Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Creative Capital Award. Cassils is an Associate Professor in Sculpture and Integrated Practices at PRATT Institute.

CASSILS WEBSITE
Featured Song: Yoko Ono "Walking On Thin Ice" Dj's Transition Edit