Drawing from deeply personal loss, yet never confined by it, their work exists in the in-between—between past and future, self and myth, transience and permanence. ‘Trans World-Building’, a term they have coined, captures this interplay: a practice where folklore, personal archives, and made-up legends construct spaces of queer survival and belonging. Each painting, sculpture, and performance is a limb from the same “twisty tree,” an evolving response to questions of identity, autonomy, and loss.

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How does your art engage with or comment on pressing contemporary issues—social,  political, or environmental?

My work is rooted in the complexities of grief, queerness and perceptions of time.  In recent years I have been using the term ‘Trans World-Building’ to describe my work as it encapsulates the chimera of materials and methods that make up my practice, and the importance of centring the transgender perspective within it. Lived experiences of loss and intense grief underpin my work. Having lost both my parents by the time I turned 23, I truly felt that I was experiencing an apocalypse and was untethered to this world.  The experience of feeling completely removed from reality enabled me to thoroughly inspect myself and build a life that is true to me. I came to grips with my transness and all the weird uncertainties that come with a queer existence, which allowed me to examine the flimsy societal structures that we are expected to follow. I like to address the multi-faceted, sometimes incomprehensible experiences of queerness through stories, folklore, factual archives, made-up myths and legends in the hope that someone can feel at home in my work. We are living in volatile times as queer people, and with autonomy over our lives being questioned by people and governments it is vital that we pave paths to our own liberation. I like to think my work plays a part in that.

How important is it for viewers to understand the intended message of your work? Does ambiguity add value, or do you seek clarity in your expression? 

I am personally a huge fan of ambiguity, although it is difficult to strike a balance between ambiguity and accessibility. I create my work with the intention of posing an open-ended question, leaving enough wiggle room to allow people to insert themselves into the narrative. I  find it can be tricky to decide how much to give away, and how much to expect back from an audience. It’s a fun kind of balancing act like that. I like to focus on the in-between - not only from a trans/non-binary standpoint but also from a post-trauma standpoint, where there is no promise of an endpoint nor the anticipation of one.  What happens when we make a legitimate home in the in-between? What does reassessing  the value of a linear timeline reveal? What was I so afraid of? It’s so liberating and terrifying all at once.

Can you take us through the evolution of an artwork, from that first spark of inspiration to the finished piece? 

It usually starts with something unsuspecting that sticks in my mind and starts to grow there - it could be an offhanded comment someone made, a waft of a smell, or a particular feeling. Right now I’m noticing a mix of inspiration from nostalgia and the idea that there are so many new feelings I haven’t yet experienced. From here I draw, I write, I collect images that speak to me. I’m the type of person who needs physical copies of everything, so I normally tear out sketchbook pages and print out images then stick them to my studio wall. 

There’s not really a time when I’m working on just one thing, as I like to switch between different forms constantly. I might spend an evening on a piece of writing that lays the groundwork for a storyline, then spend the next day working on a painting that visualises the writing, or make a part of a sculpture that inhabits that space - they’re all limbs from the same twisty tree.

 

At the beginning of a project I work very impulsively, I don’t start out with a sketch or a plan I  just go with what feels right and try not to overthink it. When painting I will choose a few colours to start with, build an acrylic and gesso background, then follow the patterns of the paint to compose the piece. Over time, things become more refined and I naturally start to focus on the key parts of a project. When involving performance, this tends to come in later on as it’s kind of like filling the space  I’ve been making through paintings, writing and sculptures. I choreograph in a collaborative way, working from prompts in audio, visual and written forms in a way that’s inspired by the methods of Pina Bausch and German Tanztheater. When it all comes together it’s the most surreal and hectic fun I could imagine, and I am pretty much always surprised at what comes out at the end.

How has your artistic style transformed over the years? Are there specific influences,  experiments, or moments that marked a turning point?

As I’m sure was the case for many of us, Covid marked a huge turning point for me. The whole world changed and went into this state of collective grief, and I suddenly felt so weirdly validated in my own personal grief after losing my dad in 2019. When he died it felt like I died too, and in a way I did. I felt like I was living through an apocalypse and in that absence of structure, familiarity and predictability, I had this bizarre space to strip everything back and really look at myself. In this time I came to know myself as trans and whilst so many things started to make sense, I also had so many questions. I was learning to live without closure as so many of us were, where I was simultaneously finding uncomfortable realisations and glorious revelations. Pre-Covid I was working primarily with performance and movement, heavily using my body as my main tool. Once lockdown began, I was no longer able to work like this in a way that felt right and I found myself turning inward. In this introspective time, I began to paint, just to see what happened, and this made sense to me. I ended up painting my series Transcapes,  creating the spaces I wished my body could exist in and I found this the most cathartic and comforting process. From there I’ve just been building on top of this feeling, ensuring everything I’m doing feels right to me instead of only making what I think I should be making.  I’ve worked with a lot of various crafts (pyrography, loom weaving, mask making) and will most likely pick up more as I go on. I quite like not knowing what’s going to happen next, and I’m learning to trust in my own capabilities.

Can art be truly therapeutic? Have you experienced its healing power personally, or seen it impact others?

I make my work with the intention of caring for myself - I’m always asking what do I need right now. What feels good? What gets me excited? I do my best to stay tuned in to these needs when making. If I’m feeling low energy, introspective, quiet, self-preserving, I will normally spend my time focusing on a painting or a smaller craft like my wood burnings or drawings. When I am high energy and feeling enthusiastic, ambitious, outgoing, this is usually when I  sculpt, paint and work on a large scale. Throughout my teen years and early twenties, I struggled a lot with my mental health and I will never forget how art was always a necessary coping method. I was so desperate to just make something so I could make sense of the world around me, so I now remind myself to never take it for granted that I can spend a whole day at the studio just making. Art feels like a long-time friend that continues to know me through every iteration of myself and I am so grateful for that.

Is art created for the artist, the audience, or somewhere in between?

I do tend to make from a very self-motivated place, and I always keep this quote from Johanna  Hedva in mind ‘The more specifically personal you can make something, the more universal resonance it will have’ (2015). By focusing inwards, the work eventually extends outwards.  I guess there is a moment where the work stops being solely mine and starts branching out to others and I have to let parts of it go. When I do my work I try to remember this process and not get too precious about it all.

How do you envision the evolution of your work in the coming years?

Bigger! I plan to keep growing my work in both scale and ambition. I’m becoming more confident with taking up space and trusting myself, so I look forward to building larger, more theatrical, more immersive installations. I envision a fully built set, something as grand as a  Kabakov piece, or as enveloping as Mark Leckey’s O Magic Power of Bleakness. I also plan to further deepen my research and continue working on the theoretical and philosophical side of my practice. It’s too easy to slip out of the habit of writing and researching, so I try to set myself small goals and deadlines to encourage myself.  I have just moved studios into SET Woolwich, and I’m really looking forward to seeing how this impacts the things I make.

What are your long-term aspirations as an artist, both personally and professionally?

My most prominent goal is to create work that is genuine, something that I and others feel connected to in obscure ways. The best feedback I could ever get from people viewing my work is that they haven’t experienced anything like it before. It’s almost like this idea of I didn’t know we were allowed to do that! And this is pretty much what realising queerness feels like too. Something I have been able to explore in recent years is my love for teaching. Having worked as a Graduate Teaching Assistant for Fine Art BA students at Central Saint Martins and having the opportunity to temporarily take on an Associate Lecturer role, I realised just how much life this work gives me. I aim to teach and lecture more alongside my own practice.  It is another big aim of mine to show work in a different country and to collaborate more with new people. London is fantastic for art but it can also become slightly echo chamber-esque. There are so many other pockets of the art world I have yet to explore, and I am so excited for when I finally do.

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Art, for Theo Dunne, is not just a practice—it’s a companion, a witness, a way to carve out a life that is honest and expansive. From painting landscapes that transcend the limitations of the body to sculpting theatrical spaces that invite immersion, their work continues to evolve—larger, bolder, more unbound. Teaching, writing, and researching form parallel strands of this world-building, each feeding into a creative practice that thrives on not knowing, on trusting the process, on allowing transformation. And perhaps, in this refusal to be fixed—to a single medium, a single identity, or a single way of being—Theo’s art makes the strongest statement of all.