“To hatch from a shell, hatch again, and emerge from another shell that follows. To understand
that I am building up generations of myself rather than digging deep for a core.
No climax. No sanctuary. No conclusion. Just tumbling.
That is the best way, at this point in my course, that I can understand gender.
Decay.” —Hunter Schafer

Scroll down to read Hunter’s entire artist’s statement.

As “trans” has become a term to define me, I sometimes wonder if my transition will come to a close before my life does. Some of the trans community yearns to efficiently move from point A to point B. Or B to A. It makes sense when trying to reach a clear destination, but that efficiency lacks luster when there is no light at the end of the tunnel.

I keep looking for sanctuary.

          in my body, but I don’t own it
          in the names I call myself, which never quite fit
          in my residence, which continually migrates
          in the clothes I wear, which weren’t made for me
          in the embrace from my community, which I fail to reciprocate,
          in a host that doesn’t seem to allow sanctuary.

I think that I might never find solace. She is just as crumbly as the places I look for her. A warped mirror of her upbringing, just like me.
But I believe trans people (everyone) can get closer to solace, traveling through an exponential decay of frameworks that might allow me to get glimpses and tastes of her—but always keeping a fair distance by virtue of accumulating enough new barriers along the way.
Or maybe she is me. If she is I will never know her.
Just as we’ve finished building a new framework on top of a crumbling structure, our new home becomes too familiar, and just as faulty.
To hatch from a shell, hatch again, and emerge from another shell that follows. To understand that I am building up generations of myself rather than digging deep for a core.
No climax. No sanctuary. No conclusion. Just tumbling.
That is the best way, at this point in my course of travel, that I can understand gender.
Decay. 
 

HUNTER SCHAFER is a multimedia artist and model based in New York City.

RILEY BUTTERY is a photographer, art student, and part-time cat owner living in Brooklyn.