Trans artists gain recognition in museums, galleries

AKI Hassan (pronoun: they/their/themself) is a trans artist. It took a long time for them to find the courage to identify themself as one. But with the recent debut of their strong solo show at Yeo Workshop, Aki is no longer afraid to call themself that. 

Like many trans artists, Aki has struggled long and hard with various issues such as gender identity, dysphoria and discrimination. That painful struggle is often expressed, either consciously or subconsciously, in their abstract art. The sculptures and paintings often feature straight lines and soft curves meeting, clashing, fusing – as if unsure what to do with each other. Colour schemes such as pinks, beiges and browns evoke flesh tones.

“For me, these lines are a way of abstracting masculinity and femininity, seeing how the two sit with each other, how their gestures meet or point to each other,” says Aki. “I find it hard to think of gender in concrete terms. When I see photographs of certain types of people, I wonder: Why don’t I look like them? Why am I different?”