Cooper Lazzell

Cooper Lazzell is an artist currently residing in Savannah, Georgia. She is currently working on her BA in Painting at the Savannah College of Art and Design as a Junior. Born in Dallas, Texas in 2003, she experienced a traditional, Classical Christian upbringing and education. This restrictive environment and its formative effect on her personal philosophies is the genesis of her artistic practice.

My work is concerned with notions of interiority and obscenity within the context of sex, gender, and the body. I view my artistic practice as a means of bringing what has traditionally been relegated to one's "private" life into the open stage of exhibition and performativity. My paintings themselves are windows into interiority and are representative of the intimate sensuality of a closeted life- a time in which I was only able to perform and view my authentic self in solitude. The images themselves are considered obscene according to normative standards, as they depict what is off-stage and typically out of view. This specific theatrical/performative notion of obscenity is the foundation of my current practice and is derived from the Ancient Greek phrase "ob skene", literally translating to off-stage. I believe it is my duty to represent the intimacy and sensuality of my trans and queer experience truthfully and boldly without compromise. The obscenity of my work is the source of its honesty and authenticity. It is an exhibition of what is behind the margins.

she/her