Sex Shells: Gender fluidity in the modern age
In collaboration with VU University Amsterdam, department of Animal ecology
Jonathan Ho with Joris Koene
The poetic and expressive work of Jonathan Ho shows hermaphrodite freshwater snails as a metaphor for gender fluidity in Sex Shells: Gender fluidity in the modern age. It points beyond the snails’ versatile sex life to the ever-expanding opportunities we humans have to shape our own identities.
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Hormone therapy, artificial insemination, assisted reproduction, sperm banks and genital modification all contribute to changing the role that gender and sexual fluidity play in society. Recent medical advances, combined with the increased use of gender-fluid identities in popular culture, enables the modern human to envision a reality that extends beyond the traditional confines of one’s biological sex. This project, a collaboration with Joris Koene of VU University Amsterdam, department of Animal ecology, is a synthesis between a modern-day temple and laboratory; An immersive installation chronicling the complex and transgressive capabilities of hermaphroditic fluidity.