This polymer clay sculpture is 32cm x 24cm x 24cm. The hair is wool and the base is a piece of wood covered with felt and dyed moss.

 

Yuval Noah Harari poses the question: “What kind of cultures, societies and political structures would have emerged in a world where several different human species coexisted?”

“The truth is that from about 2 million years ago until around 10,000 years ago, the world was home, at one and the same time, to several human species. And why not? Today there are many species of foxes, bears, and pigs. The earth of a hundred millennia ago was walked by at least six different species of man” (Harari, 2014, p. 8-9).

 

This sculpture is a kind of self-portrait inspired by my personal relationships and what they have taught me about intimacy and love. I tried to imagine what I would look like as a member of an alternate humanoid species that exists beyond the gender binary and is not reliant on sexual duality to survive, but instead has hermaphroditic reproductive capacities. I thought of this sculpture as a loophole into a reality where humans have moved away from a gendered view of anatomy and sexual reproduction and learned to look at each other’s bodies with open, wondering minds and interact in more sensitive ways. This piece is a celebration of queer love, trans-species love, and self-love.