WhiteFeather’s project with collaborator Jiabao Li, titled Sentient Clit: The Pussification of Biotech has been awarded a jury nomination for the prestigious Ars Electronica S+T+ARTS Prize of the European Commission, honoring Innovation in Technology, Industry and Society stimulated by the Arts.

About the project:

We investigate the potential of producing lab-grown clitorises by isolating stem cells from menstrual fluid and 3D-bioprinting them into anatomically accurate gel supports (clits) for in vitro growth. We have differentiated the cells into neuronal types to speculate creating clitorises that respond ‘intelligently’ to stimuli through cultured neural networks. This reconfigures the notion of feminine pleasure as passive response, to the embodied sentience of a discerning actor: Could clits think?

We challenge dominant narratives in tech by advocating for post-humanist feminist methodology focused on eroticism beyond reproduction, towards inclusive potential for women and nonbinary people. Our work is conveyed through video performance, microscopy, digital art, and a large-scale inflatable clit in a petri dish to deconstruct gender norms and foster multifaceted discourse on pleasure and sexuality.

We performed our biopolitics on OnlyFans in the tradition of feminist body art, to strategically disrupt digital consumption patterns around women’s sexual selves and address biocapitalist uses of technology that objectify bodies and control pleasure. Our project scrutinizes ethical complexities of bioprinted organs capable of neural responses, questioning ideas of consent and sentience in bioengineering to call for a broad reevaluation of tech advance in its sociocultural impacts.

More information on the Ars Electronica website, here: https://ars.electronica.art/starts-prize/en/sentient-clit/