after swallowing
2023, audiovisual theater
Ars Electronicca, Deep Space 8k
IT:U
Futurelab
In this performative work, Pubalova and Sikau examine the medicalized history of
guts with philosophies of making connection and rehearsing multi-organ communication.
Diagnosed with the irritable bowel syndrome and gastric mucosa, Sikau has
been engaging with the paradoxical signals of her gut since childhood. But whereas
gastric mucosa is a diagnosis, the irritable bowel syndrome (affecting 10-15% of
the population in Europe) is merely a description of ambiguous symptoms which so
far cannot be successfully addressed within the healthcare system. Untraceable via
visual means such as colonoscopy or gastroscopy, the duo was curious to approach
their gut through sound technologies and performance.
In relation to the physical constitution of this organ, the semipermeable quality of its
serpentine lines undergo significant transformations within the clinical environments
– with one of the extremes being a lifelong ostomy (which is an artificial outlet for the
bowel). As such, the project intends to apply these theories to the gut as queer organ
that, beyond its material form, inherits a queer slippage between ‘physiological
matter, metaphor or figuration, and “gut-level” feeling states’. Whereas a lot of artistic
and research process currently oscillate around the microbiome, this project sees
some avenues for research with relation to our guttural capacity to attune to sounds,
thereby potentially enhancing our wellbeing by hearing beyond the ear.