Cassils is an artist and bodybuilder who uses their exaggerated physique to intervene in various contexts in order to interrogate systems of power and control. Their work provides an intimate and empowering image of their body that also symbolizes the broader efforts of the broader transgendered community dealing with body transformation and public presentation.
The performance Tiresias is inspired by the mythological character of the same name. He was the blind prophet of Thebes, famous for being transformed into a woman for seven years. Cassils wore cataract lenses to cloud their vision and held their body against a neoclassical Greek male torso, carved out of ice, to fit their body exactly. Throughout the event, they melted the torso with their own body heat, enacting the gender transformation. They cast the myth of Tiresias as a story of endurance and transformation, in which masculinity both freezes the body, and melts it away.
