Nomi Chi

Canadian, b. 1989

Exploring gender, sexuality, ritual, and the search for identity, Nomi Chi’s artworks have a potent narrative. Often comprised of fantastically-constructed animal-human hybrids, Chi uses this imagery to tell personal stories and to create a new mythological canon for his tattoo clients. Chi’s art frequently contains multi-limbed, androgenized creatures who exemplify constantly shifting interpretations of self and other. Chi is a tattooist currently living in unceded Coast Salish, Musqueam, Skxwú7mesh, Tsleil-Waututhlands, also known as Vancouver, Canada.  He is a non-binary person who uses they/he pronouns.

I came out as a trans person in the past couple of years and have been thinking around representing the body … about gender nonconforming mythologies and how gender nonconforming creatures and people can be scapegoated within particular cultures … I'm thinking around the feminine as monstrous particularly … and delving into Chimeric images and thinking of the self as fragmented and a hodgepodge of all these different monstrous parts.