My Time in New York

Charlie Wetzel

My Time in New York is about my experience undergoing gender-affirming vaginoplasty. The piece incorporates video, sculpture, photography, and performance. The short film consists of clips from the three weeks I spent in the city, and it is set to a score of church bells that I had my medical team play as I was anesthetized – when I was born in 2001, my mother played the same music in the delivery room. The intro is from an edited speech by Harvey Milk, who was assassinated for being the first openly gay man elected in California. The plaster relief sculptures are made from life casts of my body before and after surgery. The photographic prints are made from images I took in the hospital and my Brooklyn convalescent home, where I recovered with my parents and younger sisters.

opened 7/22/2022
Charlie Wetzel