Hairy Art

Feature image: Woman Combing her Hair, Władysław Ślewiński, 1909 via Google Arts and Culture

Hair has been used as a medium for artistic purposes since the 17th century. The Victorians used the hair of their deceased loved ones to create intricate artworks that could be hung on the wall. This mourning ritual acted as a way for friends and family to remember their dead. While this art form has fallen out of favor, hair as an art medium has not. While hair often contains profound meaning and beauty, it can also elicit reactions of disgust when discovered in an undesirable place. The following selection of artists explores the contextual nuance of hair, highlighting the wide variety of roles hair can play across cultures and time periods. 

In this iconic work, Meret Oppenheim covered a teacup, saucer, and spoon in gazelle fur. The work's name, Object, is intentionally vague and broad. Oppenheim was a surrealist, and as such, she wished for the viewer to create their own understanding of the piece. Regardless, the thought of sipping any liquid from a furry cup is wholly unappealing and unappetizing.

For Soap, Tom Friedman created a spiral effect on a bar of soap using pubic hair. Friedman recognized that hair on soap is generally viewed as disgusting, but he was unexpectedly inspired on one occasion in the shower. Friedman “found it beautiful - the curves on the white background of the soap.” The thin spiral line created a kind of meditative effect that is only disrupted by the knowledge of the material used in its creation. 

Short Haired Cheese is exactly what it sounds like: a wedge of cheese with black strands of hair protruding from its rind. Robert Gober created the cheese from wax, then added strands of black hair taken from one of his studio assistants. This work, like Oppenheim’s, is rather unsettling. The presence of human hair lends the work an anthropomorphic feel, which is quite the discomfiting characteristic in a work of art that depicts a piece of cheese. To say the least, this work elicits queasiness and feelings of disgust within the viewer.

Between 2004 and 2018 Melanie Bilenker created several line drawings out of hair. Many of the works she created are wearable as pendants or brooches. These works are delicate, yet precise and detailed in their subject matter. In some ways, these works feel reminiscent of the Victorian hair art that adorned the walls of homes. Bilenker gives this idea a contemporary twist by incorporating modern imagery into these wearable works of art. 

Diane Jacobs has produced a large catalog of sculptural works made with human hair. She shared, “For me, hair represents humanity and it is a rich material thick with history, genetics, and societal taboos.” Jacobs often used her own hair, shorn from her head, to create her sculptures. For Hairball Machine, Jacobs rolled different colors of hair into little balls and placed them in a gumball machine. In other works, she has also employed her hair to fashion a brain, an hourglass replete with round hairballs, and a hairy newspaper.

Like most of the artists mentioned here, Keith W. Bentley has completed a series of works containing hair. Specifically, Bentley worked with horse hair for a series called Cauda Equina. This title refers to the bundle of nerves at the end of the spinal cord that provide motor and sensory function to the lower half of the body (literally translated to “horse’s tail” in Latin). The hair used for many of Bentley’s works was collected from slaughtered horses. For these works, the artist also drew from the Victorian tradition, paying homage to its use as a funerary custom. Bentley’s works serve as a memorial to the thousands of horses killed each year in rendering plants.

Jayoung Yoon fashions sculptures from her own hair. She weaves and knots the hair to create ethereal, nearly transparent works. The results are an intriguing treat for the senses. Yoon has created bowls, a skull, and a lotus flower all from her hair. Yoon uses human hair because it “has the potential to embody both mind and matter.” Yoon also feels that “hair evokes matter through its visceral, tactile quality, inviting the viewer to engage with the physicality of the present.”

Laetitia Ky is an artist and activist who uses her hair as a sculpting material, complementing it with wires and wool extensions where needed. Using this technique, she has transfigured her hair into a trumpet, butterfly wings, a tree, a uterus, and so much more. Ky’s hair sculptures often speak to gender equality and perceptions of black bodies in visual media. The technically complex compositions that cascade from her head draw the viewer in to engage them in deeper conversation. 

Hair is part of the human experience—we encounter it on our own bodies as well as on the people and animals around us. This universal material is multifaceted in both its meaning and purpose. It is an object that, onto some, projects power and beauty while invoking disgust and uncleanliness in others. Artists who harness hair as a medium engage in key dialogue that interrogates the different contexts in which the presence of hair can convey starkly different meanings. 

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