aurel schmidt

TRASH DOLLS

Having lived in downtown New York for more than 20 years, Canadian artist Aurel Schmidt belongs to the New York art scene that her work ironically mirrors. Her sense of glamour is rooted in coolness, attitude, irreverence, and fun — qualities embodied by young New Yorkers who instinctively subvert fashion codes, mixing high and low, punk and elegance, trashy accessories with luxury items, dressing for the night while navigating the city with studied indifference.

Begun in 2019, her ongoing series Trash Dolls portrays her cohort through drawings of figures made from cigarette butts, plastic containers, condoms, dollar bills, candy wrappers, and corks. Echoing Arcimboldo’s composite portraits of fruits and vegetables, Schmidt’s dolls reject good taste and high style with self-deprecation and humor — ironically exposing a plastic society shaped by fast fashion, street food, and trash-strewn gutters.

— Olivier Zahm

 

ALL ARTWORK BY AUREL SCHMIDT, TRASH DOLLS…