By Mara Veitch
Nadia Lee Cohen is tired. It has been just over a year since she released her latest monograph, Hello My Name Is…—a masterwork in worldbuilding that saw the British-born conceptualist transform 33 nametags fished from flea markets and estate sales into living, breathing characters.
The project, which evolved into Lee Cohen’s first U.S. solo exhibition with Jeffrey Deitch in Los Angeles a few months later, features a portrait of each character (rather, a “self-portrait;” the artist has an impressive prosthetics girl), accompanied by a monologue and a snapshot of the objects—coupons, pocket combs, the odd cellophane-wrapped candy—that make up the detritus of a human life.
There’s Teena, a heavily-bronzed Pizza Hut employee with an aspirational updo; Morris, a suburban physician with quivering jowls in the throes of a divorce; and Brenda, a bawdy PayLess cashier who passes her time behind the register by counting every stitch on the sleeve of her polyester blouse. Each character feels shudderingly real, a sign of the empathy and care with which Lee Cohen constructed them.
In the time since the project’s release, the multimedia artist has spent her every waking moment transforming to fit new roles—shooting magazine covers and directing fashion campaigns—making the period of quiet introspection that birthed Hello My Name Is… feel like a lifetime ago.
“If I didn’t have this job, I would probably live in Paris or London,” she says. “I like cafe culture, flowers, romance, all those pretty things—but they don’t inspire me.”
It’s here, in the trashed and sun-bleached absurdity of Los Angeles, that Lee Cohen feels most at home as an artist. Below, the artist—ever on the go—pauses to reflect on her king-making project and the city that inspired it.
All images curtosey of NLC & Jeffery Deitch Gallery
NADIA LEE COHEN: I’m so sorry that I’m driving. Also, you may hear pig noises. That’s my friend’s little dog in the back.
MARA VEITCH: What have you been doing since the last time we talked?
NLC: Oh god, so much. I’m just tired. I feel a deep tired lately, I wonder if it’s medical.
MV: It’s been about a year since you released your last monograph, Hello My Name Is…, and a little less since your big show at Jeffrey Deitch in Los Angeles. How has your relationship with these characters changed in that time?
NLC: I have a fondness for specific characters, but I wish that some of them had never been born.
MV: Why?
NLC: Because I know they could have been better. It’s fine. I mean, that’s how everyone is. But I can’t look at my own books, I can’t. But I am proud of certain ones and don’t think I would change anything about them now. But I think about them—they’re a part of me, after all. Even the more frustrating ones.
MV: What makes a character feel real to you?
NLC: The thing that makes a real character is a contradiction. You know, like when you see a big tough guy with a little dog. Those are the things that interest me about people when the way they sneeze or the way they decorate their home isn’t what you expect. That’s why I’m fascinated by people’s objects. But of course, some of them do have little quirks and details that I borrowed directly from “real” people. Family members, mostly.
MV: What do you think is the biggest contradiction in you?
NLC: That’s hard. It must be that I faint at the sight of blood, though I’m not sure what this contradicts besides my deep love of violent cinema. I had a blood test yesterday, and I had to watch The Godfather on my phone to stop myself from fainting.
MV: Which scene?
NLC: The one where Sonny gets gunned down at the toll booth.
MV: What aspect of this transformation process is most exciting to you?
NLC: I mean, obviously everyone’s interested in good-looking people. But when I’m talking to my prosthetics girl, I get really excited about like, a weird calf vein, or these particular kinds of eyebags that some people have, or the way that somebody enunciates. It’s just those little things about people. But this was also during that pandemic period of, like, nothing. I don’t know if I would have been able to dive so deeply into becoming someone else now.
MV: Of the many material components of this project—portrait photography, performance, sculpture, assemblage—I’ve always found the pocket contents to be the most moving. Somehow, those little remnants like candy wrappers, combs, and ticket stubs are what make a person real.
NLC: That was the element that I was most excited about. That was one of the calmest and most contented periods in my life. I was trying to understand who each person was by combing through the charity shops, flea markets, and estate sales here and in the UK. For some characters, I hunted for specific objects, little inside jokes, that I wanted them to have. A lot of it is just lying around my house now, which I know doesn’t sound good. I’m trying to be a minimalist.
MV: What are the little objects that represent you?
NLC: Aquaphor for my lips, a little silver pill box that my mum got last Christmas, a Versace gift card that I’ll probably never spend, a miniature rubber chicken keychain from Japan, my pet stone “Bonting” from when I was a kid. Red hair dye, various skin creams, wood of some sort—because “touch wood” is the only religion I follow—also a commemorative plate with a photo of the Queen Mother on it, because I collect gaudy royal memorabilia. And hotel slippers.
MV: Would you say that you’re funny?
NLC: I mean, I come from a background of dark humor. My brother’s a comic actually, he’s very good. Out of all the people closest to me, he gets my sense of humor the most. I think it’s just bled unconsciously into my personal work. But really I’m just drawn to people who make me laugh and don’t take themselves too seriously. Is this making sense?
MV: Yes.
NLC: It’s tricky because I’m not a great talker, and I’m not a great seller of my work. Usually, I can kind of hide behind it because it’s so loud.
MV: You’ve been described as a shapeshifter. Would you say that you’re a shapeshifter?
NLC: Yes, I am. I look different all the time. I like to transform, it’s all part of the whole dress-up thing I guess. I mean, I’m not a character day-to-day. People always think I’ll end up looking like Iris Apfel with the jewelry and the big glasses, but I’ll probably end up like my mom—in jeans with long grey hair. I just dyed my hair ginger, and I’m really like that for now.
MV: What was your first transformation?
NLC: I grew up on a farm, isolated. Then I went to high school in Essex. I arrived on my first day wearing a really long skirt and big Clarks shoes—like, three sizes too big—that came with a free watch. I had two Princess Leia buns and my monobrow was unplucked. When I got there, I was like, “This is not the look that everyone is going for. These popular girls have bleached hair, long nails, and they’re tanned.” As soon as I figured that out, I bleached my hair, put on loads of tan, and bleached my eyebrows. I think that was my earliest one.
MV: It’s a tough time. I had a single eyebrow for far too long myself.
NLC: I want to see them, but I’m driving so I can’t.
MV: What’s something that people often get wrong about you?
NLC: Oh, that’s interesting. I always get the same stuff. People assume that I’m like, obsessed with the ‘50s and ‘60s or something, which could not be further from what I’m interested in. People assume I have that nostalgia, but it’s more about narrative to me than it is about nostalgia. There are particular areas that I’m inspired by—art and the cinema that I’m drawn to. I just don’t really relate to the modern landscape, so that’s why people make this assumption. But for me, it’s more about narrative and less about nostalgia.
MV: What is it about the modern landscape that feels less relatable? Doesn’t everyone always feel that way in their time?
NLC: No, I think a lot of people feel like, “This is the time!” But I feel adrift. I think I get it from my mom. Her house is full of Victoriana.
MV: How would you describe the difference between your public, creative persona and your private one?
NLC: Oh, they’re completely separate. This is the constant battle that I live with. If I didn’t have this job, I would probably live in Paris or London on a nice busy street, and wander around. I like cafe culture, flowers, romance, all those pretty things—but they don’t inspire me. I’ve tried to make work in Paris before, and it doesn’t work. There’s a huge difference between the world that I actually want to live in, that makes me happy, and what inspires me creatively. For me, LA is really perfect for making work. There’s such a weird, magical quality to the architecture and the landscape. It’s barren and has all these connotations that I don’t really understand properly—One second. There’s a bin in my driveway.
MV: Take your time.
NLC: That’s better, these bloody bins. What was I saying? Oh right. I make my best work in LA.