Shala Miller: Scar Light

“Wrong anatomy” and “unlucky” were the explanations Shala Miller received for her recurrent ovarian torsions. At the beginning of this year, the artist underwent her third emergency surgery. Desperate to understand why her insides decide to twist until death (her right ovary in 2003) or near death (her left in 2025), Miller looks to her scars as a kind of guiding light with a dual-fold hope—one, to ease the internal unease, and two, to break free from the isolation in which the US healthcare system often puts Black female-bodied people.

Shala Miller (b. 1993), also known as Freddie June when they sing, was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, by two southerners named Al and Ruby Miller. At around the age of ten or eleven, she discovered quietude, the kind you’re sort of pushed into, and then was fooled into thinking that this is where they should stay put. Since then, Shala Miller has been trying to find their way out and find her way into an understanding of herself and her history, using photography, video, writing, and singing as an aid in this process.

For the exhibition Scar Light at ZOLLAMT MMK, Shala Miller is creating a new, expansive work. Scar Light is her first institutional solo exhibition worldwide.