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Emma Xhaxho:
Tender Violence

Emma Xhaxho’s September 2026 MIAR show Close to Pleasure lives at the threshold of fantasy and reality. With hardware as fetish wear, dreamscapes as paintings, and inanimate objects as surrogates for the artist’s own body, Xhaxho embraces what some may consider lewd, reminding us that the line between indecent and intimate is razor thin.

In preparation for the opening, NEW Gallery’s Alexandra Bishop joined Xhaxho in conversation about the artist’s hopes for the exhibition.

EX: I'm trying to confront when your body stops being your own and when you are a vessel for someone else's imagination.

With the larger sculptural works in the show that have the human form hidden within them, I hope to create an almost voyeuristic point of view that prompts feelings of empathy, guilt, or embarrassment.

During my BFA show when I showed “I'm in the shape that she made me”, which is a sculpture posed in this lewd position, I could see people avert their eyes or purposely try not to stand directly behind it. People knew the other people at the show could see them in relation to the piece and observe how they were interacting with it. You could see people become self-aware of how they might be perceived by others while perceiving the piece itself.

I want that self confrontation. Why do you feel what you feel when viewing these inanimate objects?

NG: Close to Pleasure will contain works that use not only the female form, but also masculine icons and figures. How did you come to create these masculine forms?

EX: Although I am a female artist and I am speaking from that perspective, that experience also encapsulates navigating masculinity. I’m questioning my own preconceived notions about masculinity. With “Please do not fault your dog for his nature”, yes there is humor and it’s funny, but it’s also very serious. I'm not necessarily poking fun at masculinity and manhood in and of itself, I'm more poking at hyper-masculinity or ego. It’s this big, phallic-like symbol of strength, but the spikes make it purposeless. It becomes a show pony, no longer a natural part of the human body with a purpose.

NG: This is why I really love the show’s painting “I’ve become passive”. In the BDSM community, submission is as much about intellectual stimulation as it is physical. To your point, it’s about ego and psychological identity bound to or rejected in relation to assigned gender, rather than just about gender in and of itself.

There's also going to be a brand new sculpture in the show. Could you talk about what that is and what it's composed of?

EX: I'm making a sister piece to the other body sculpture, “I'm in the shape that she made me”. This iteration is focused more on embarrassment and shame, and the figure is concealed a bit more.

For this new work, I am creating molds and casting my own feet, building with foam, and incorporating hair extensions, blankets, and fibers.

In addition to this new sculpture, Close to Pleasure will also be the first time I am showing "The two-faced saintly and sinister woman" mixed media object and the “Carpet Surfing" painting.

NG: What will visitors experience and see in Close to Pleasure? What do you hope they leave feeling and thinking about?


EX: I hope they see something that will draw them closer, repel them, and attract their curiosity. I hope to create an experience where all of these feelings overlap.

I hope that they leave with a chuckle, but also that they question whether pain and pleasure are truly opposites and if their body stores those things in the same place.

NEW GALLERY: How would you describe your practice?

EMMA XHAXHO: I'm an interdisciplinary artist fascinated with how our body stores intimate feelings. I’m particularly interested in how ordinary objects can reveal our psychological, internal lives.

Often my works try to find the line between consent and refusal, embarrassment, pain and pleasure. The work asks “Is the line between these super thick, or are these much closer to each other than we assume?”

NG: The way you combine everyday objects with more “loaded” imagery, like the pair of underwear on plumbing pipes in "Urine Poem", creates a really interesting result. It’s uncomfortable, but it’s also humorous. It’s a great example of the scenarios you create wherein viewers go through a variety of emotions and have to face what they are and are not comfortable with and question why that might be so.

Are there specific reactions and feelings you're hoping you might be able to produce with Close to Pleasure?

"I’m questioning my own preconceived notions about masculinity... I'm not necessarily poking fun at masculinity and manhood in and of itself, I'm more poking at hyper-masculinity or ego."

"Often my works try to find the line between consent and refusal, embarrassment, pain and pleasure.

The work asks 'Is the line between these super thick, or are these much closer to each other than we assume?'"

Emma Xhaxho is an interdisciplinary, first-generation American artist born and raised in Chicago. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is currently pursuing her MFA at Washington University's Sam Fox School in St. Louis. Her practice spans sculpture, fibers, printmaking, and installation.

Images courtesy of the artist.

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