dreamgurl features a series of self-portraits that explore the production and reproduction of sexually explicit images.

Stewart was inspired to begin this series after a video of her 2020 performance “La Négresse blanche,” which includes nudity, was downloaded by an anonymous Vimeo user named “J” and shared on various pornographic sites without her consent in February 2021. After processing this violation, Stewart felt that she needed to reckon with the fact that her art can be classified as pornographic because it centers her naked body. Rather than disavow this designation, Stewart uses this series as an opportunity to explore the possibility of being a producer of pornographic images.

Stewart started collecting dozens of vintage 1980s Playboy magazines to study the physical language and gestures displayed in archetypal pornographic materials. Cutting out the bodies of white (and often highly bronzed and airbrushed) centerfold models, Stewart embarked on a mission to entirely cover her body in an assemblage of thousands of magazine clippings.

dreamgurl documents Stewart’s construction of garish Frankenstein-esque molds of her body, an act that took place across two days at the Institute for Electronic Arts. The messy performance incorporated honey, Q-tips, saliva, sweat, hair, and dirt.