Edition 01: Suck My Code: Cyborgs & Sex
Participating Artists: Livia Foldes, Avatar Lilith, Ava Mirage Wanbli, Célin Jiang, Come Ferrasse and Charis
“The glitch challenges us to consider how we can “penetrate … break … puncture … tear” the material of the institution, and, by extension, the institution of the body. Thus, hacking the “code” of gender, making binaries blurry, becomes our core objective, a revolutionary catalyst. Glitched bodies—those that do not align with the canon of white cisgender heteronormativity—pose a threat to social order. Range-full and vast, they cannot be programmed.”
- Excerpt From Glitch Feminism, Legacy Russell, 2020
connectedmatter is pleased to present its debut exhibition, SUCK MY CODE! CYBORGS & SEX, the first edition of a continual performance series dedicated to the exploration of art, technology, gender, race, and sustainability.
Featuring one workshop animated by Livia Foldes, two performances by Avatar Lilith and Ava Mirage Wanbli, and three new media installations by Célin Jiang, Ulysse Lazar, and Charis, this edition explores the intricacies between gender, sexuality, and technology.
Inspired by the famous VNS Matrix Bitch Mutant Manifesto (1996), SUCK MY CODE! is an ode to those who work to dismantle systems of patriarchy and oppression within cyberspaces. In light of the double objective of cyberfeminism, which historically excluded queer/BIPOC voices, we ask: how can we gather and organize to craft alternative realities? Can we critically engage with the notion of a cyborg? How can we be more integrative when it comes to art and technology? How can we avoid gatekeeping our work within an insular academic community that remains distant from our lived experiences?
In a world where technology is fetishized as a black box, this exhibition instills a conversation through art's collectivist potential while resisting oppressive standpoints. Designed as a glitch—a resistance to the imposed binarity of our futures—it creates a joyful yet subversive space. SUCK MY CODE! provokes thought, addressing issues often excluded from mainstream narratives while fantasizing and organizing our collective futures.
Referring to Gretchen Bender’s (1951-2004) Total Recall (1987), this installation reflects on alienation and hyper-realism within today's media landscape. The shift from bulky CRT TVs to smartphones mirrors the mesmerizing trap of social media algorithms and the growing logic of consumption.
In parallel with the event, twenty USBs containing academic readings, artworks, audio tracks, and an open letter by Ava Wanbli regarding the violence she experienced at the University of Chicago will be distributed. Access to education and cultural resources is a privilege. Sharing the theoretical framework of this event is a practice designed for transparency and equity.
Sertraline Dolls by Ava Wanbli (Performance, 2023) is a performative exploration where the artist collides multiple temporalities of self, focusing on the evolution of her trans body. Through reconnection and deconstruction of past and future desires, the performance critically examines how society consumes bodies—particularly the ways in which trans women's bodies are fetishized and objectified through media and sexualized narratives. A central aspect of the performance involves the artist resurrecting her former "boy" self, a figure who longed to be with a trans woman. In a transformative act, she grants that desire—only for him to realize that the trans woman he desired is, in fact, her.
Open Source by Avatar Lilith (Performance, 2023) expands the idea of boundaries and membranes as it relates to algorithms and technology. The Black Box is an engineering and computer science term that describes a device or system which produces output (data) without revealing any information about its internal mechanism. This presents an asymmetry of power between developers, technology, corporations, and “users.” With AI becoming more present in our cultural exchanges, how can we exist in a future that holds truth and veritability as a pillar of society? How can we be true to ourselves and each other? By giving the Black Box flesh and blood, Open Source attempts to reimagine the boundaries and membranes between both bodies that generate internal and external motion (Avatar Lilith and the Black Box). Where does one end and the other begin?
NIVEA, L’ÉTERNITÉ N’EXISTE PAS [NIVEA, ETERNITY DOES NOT EXIST] by Celin Jiang (Video performance, 2021) explores how advancements in technology and video tools have transformed the dynamics of social networks and live streaming. The work highlights how these developments have amplified the performativity of emotions and interactions online, shaping the way we experience and express affect in digital spaces. Thus, the implementation of Live Streaming within social network platforms drastically transforms how we interact with each other, and how we perceive the human body. The perfect simulation of our humanity is scattered, viral, and co-created. As our attention is quantified, and viewed, we desire in a non-haptic world of screens. Possibilities of physical contact slowly fade away, while simultaneously offering new ways to be touched. The fluctuation of the emotional palette is wide and paradoxical, confronting us with multiple interpretations of desire and the production of its image.
The digital space of the social web appears as an accessible territory, which we strive to conquer and design according to prefabricated fantasies where affective and emotional capitalism seems limitless. It's about a kind of perpetual spectacle mixed with “real” life. Virtual spaces and activities then infiltrate our intimacy in such a way that we can no longer dissociate them from an algorithmic staging of an experience of the hyper-real: our behaviors make them all real.
Polysémiologie rectale [my anus is a weapon] (video, 2023) by Côme Ferrasse is a wearable installation that takes the viewer on an endoscopic journey through the artist's anus, inviting reflection on the potential of their own. The piece features six heavy ceramic sculptures, each corresponding to an adjective that describes the artist’s anus from both personal and societal perspectives. Each cavity contains a symbolic surprise, and as the artist moves from one to the next, they reveal and confess the meaning behind each one.
This work offers a provocative, unsettling commentary on the often-overlooked power of the body. Through this intimate exploration, the artist highlights the strength and activity of our most concealed parts, challenging societal taboos and drawing attention to the muscular and expressive capabilities of our "holes."