interior wanderings/ even with their tools inside us
This piece is part of a body of work which critiques the social implications of classical Greek thought used throughout the Age of Reason/Enlightenment, which is directly connected to contemporary practices of white supremacy. In 17th-19th century Europe, the reverence of rationality, and romanticization of Ancient Greek scholars contributed to justifications for medical violence and misdiagnosis, biological reasons for insanity, enforced gender identities and stereotypes, and logic behind sexual violence.
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This work's initial inspiration comes from the Ancient Greek belief of the wandering womb. The belief holds that behaviors and illnesses of people who have a uterus, are due to the fact that their wombs are wandering through their abdomen. This belief contributed to a medical history full of misconceptions about pain, anatomy, and mental health specifically for non-white/cis/male bodies. Supported by Plato, Hippocrates, and Aristotle, as well as most male physicians, this belief excused the control over assigned-women's bodies . It was believed that the womb’s wild nature inherently caused weakness of body and mind. The womb itself was either considered a demon, a poisonous animal, or a defect. To relieve the wandering womb, physicians would prescribe constant (penetrative) sex ideally to keep people pregnant so their wombs would not wander off. More forceful acts of “remedy” would also develop with no “success”. Eventually this belief lead to the reasoning for psychological pathologies, one of which would become known as hysteria: the diagnosis that women are inherently hysterical. This dark history reveals some of the absurd (mis)understandings of behavior, gender, and biology, which brings to light the continuous mistreatment, misdiagnosis, and violence in reproductive health today.
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This work collects imagery from hysteroscopies (or uterine imaging), and projects it back onto spaces of historical oppression and institutions built upon colonial hierarchies. The body's cyclical nature, in connection to celestial movement, can be harnessed as a tool for healing and meditation from painful history. The piece only plays at night to be in conversation with the moon phases.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-54160638 - happening right now
