Yasmin Watts sculpts the human figure as an emotional presence. Her figures lean, fold, twist and turn, responding to the spaces they inhabit. Rather than describing a particular person or narrative, they hold gestures and states that remain open to interpretation.

Figures appear. Not figures. Fragments. Echoes.
‍ ‍They come from distance. They come from memory.

The body becomes a way of considering presence and absence, vulnerability and strength, rootedness and drift. A torso may be suspended between surfaces, a limb half reaching or a figure partly concealed. These are bodies in states of becoming, caught between one place and another.

Their gestures are shaped in relation to space. Figures may be folded into an enclosure, held at an edge or positioned within a threshold. The surrounding structure becomes part of the body’s presence, creating moments where the boundary between figure and environment begins to dissolve.

The scale is often intimate and the surfaces tactile. Watts works through both hand and digital processes, combining sculpted forms with 3D scanning, printing and hand finishing. Sanding, joining and painting leave traces of the making process, allowing the surface to carry both physical and emotional weight.

They are not statues. They are presences.

Rooted in Watts’ experience of living between cultures, the figures hold a sense of movement between places, memories and states of belonging. They do not offer a fixed narrative. Instead, their ambiguity leaves space for personal associations and recognition.

Each figure becomes a site,
not of explanation, but of recognition.

Placed within and around her micro spaces, the figures create relationships between the body and its surroundings. Their stillness can suggest listening, waiting, retreat or emergence, while their gestures invite us to sense rather than resolve what is happening.

The figure becomes both physical and emotional: a body that carries memory, occupies space and remains open to change.

The figure becomes both physical and emotional: a body that carries memory, occupies space and remains open to change.

I don't explain. I shape. I listen. I remember.