Judge Thumbs, 2025

Wood, oil and acrylic paint 3 x 3 x 90 cm each

For Judge Thumbs, I carved wooden sticks each terminating in a thumb, tied together in bunches. The saying, “rule of thumb” refers to the thumb as a rough, pre-instrumental unit of measure, and over time it became a metaphor for practical knowledge. The saying also carries an erroneous yet persistent folk etymology: that English law permitted a man to beat his wife with a stick no thicker than his thumb. The persistence of this story illuminates how myths of measurement, authority, and violence remain entangled and still resonate today. The estranged sculpture is at once a tool, body part, and relic of judgment. What was once a natural extension of the body is recast as an emblem of law and power, exposing how measurement slips between intimacy and violence, the personal and the institutional.