Who’s That Nude Figure on a Washing Machine Outside the New Museum?

British artist Sarah Lucas unveiled a new public sculpture, VENUS VICTORIA (2026), at the New Museum’s triangular entrance plaza on the Bowery in Lower Manhattan, where it will remain on view for two years. The glossy, nude, female-coded figure—adapted from Lucas’s long-running Bunnies series (1997–ongoing)—is perched atop a washing machine in yellow high heels and is intended, according to the museum, to lampoon the traditionally male history of monumental public statuary. The New Museum and Lucas unveiled the work on Tuesday, May 12, launching a decade-long series of public commissions by women artists tied to the museum’s recently unveiled building. Lucas said she conceived the work while developing her 2023 Tate Modern exhibition Happy Gas, and described choosing this figure for its “exuberance, optimism, and general good feeling.”

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