Mænd – Monstered (2023–24)
Mænd – Monstered (2023–24) examines how contemporary media imagery shapes our perception of masculinity and intent. Drawing primarily from fashion magazines, Scott appropriates portraits of men that traditionally convey confidence, beauty, and status. Through minimal but deliberate interventions - small incisions, shifts, and reassemblies - these composed figures are subtly transformed into unsettling hybrid forms. The resulting “monsters” are not grotesque inventions but distortions that emerge from the very images designed to celebrate male identity.
The project began with Scott’s growing fascination with how visual culture frames masculinity. In a media landscape saturated with stylised representations, he became increasingly interested in how easily a figure could be reinterpreted through context and manipulation. A widely reported incident in the United States, in which a man was fatally shot after being presumed to have malicious intent, sharpened this enquiry. The event prompted Scott to reflect on how quickly suspicion can be constructed through appearance alone, and how media narratives contribute to an atmosphere in which individuals are judged before they are understood.
The process of collage is central to the work. Images are carefully sourced and juxtaposed so that each cut carries both aesthetic and conceptual weight. Rather than dramatically reconstructing the image, Scott employs restrained gestures that shift the viewer’s reading of the subject. A face may fragment, align with an architectural edge, or merge with surrounding forms. As observed in Collé Magazine Issue 40, these compositions “merge human forms with abstract shapes, creating a striking visual language that challenges the everyday, reflecting a conceptual exploration of destruction and creation.”
The series was later exhibited in Wrestling (2025), where its exploration of perception and misinterpretation became more explicit. In these works, Scott demonstrates how small distortions can radically alter our understanding of a subject, echoing the subtle manipulations through which media narratives are often constructed. The collages occupy a delicate space between portraiture and abstraction, where recognition remains intact but certainty dissolves.
Mænd – Monstered ultimately asks the viewer to confront the instability of visual judgement. By transforming familiar images through the simplest of interventions, Scott reveals how easily representation can slip into misrepresentation, and how quickly the monstrous can emerge from the ordinary when perception is guided by assumption rather than attention.