fat and furious (2024) is a sculptural reclamation of how fat bodies are treated in society—constructed from a discarded mannequin and recycled materials to confront the dehumanization of fatness and the cultural obsession with thinness. Made entirely from salvaged and repurposed objects, the piece transforms societal “trash” into a powerful reflection on worth, embodiment, and resistance.
The average size in the United States is a size 18, yet “plus sizes” in most stores start at a size 12-14. The so-called “obesity epidemic” categorizes 42% of United States citizens as “obese,” using a dated and disproven metric developed with a dataset of entirely white military men in the 1800s. We let these arbitrary “metrics” determine our worth, behaviors, insurance premiums, and access to transportation, the built environment, healthcare, etc.
As a society, we’ve completely skewed our understanding of human size, crafting a culture that only caters to the thinnest among us. The US treats fat people like trash—stripping us of all sense of humanity and constantly pressuring use to shrink ourselves (both literally and figuratively). The culture names our existence as one of their biggest fears. And yet therein lies the crux of it all: the way we embrace and forge safety in our fat bodies brims with extraordinary, transformative power.
Constructed from a used, thin mannequin covered in “trash” from bottle caps to discarded backpack straps, this piece embodies how fat people are treated in modern society, not only in its construction but in its very soul. It sheds new light on an incredibly common lived experience, being a byproduct of our culture, and empowers the viewer to reflect on the ways in which they partake in this cultural norm.