BIO
Mary Maggic (b. 1991, Los Angeles) is a nonbinary Chinese-American artist and researcher working within the fuzzy intersections of body and gender politics and capitalist ecological alienations. Based in Vienna since 2017, Maggic frequently uses biohacking as a xeno-feminist practice of care that serves to demystify invisible lines of molecular biopower. After completing their Masters at MIT Media Lab (Design Fiction), their project “Open Source Estrogen” was awarded Honorary Mention at the Prix Ars Electronica '17 in Hybrid Arts, and in 2019 they completed a 10-month Fulbright residency in Yogyakarta, Indonesia investigating the relationship between Javanese mysticism and the plastic pollution crisis. Maggic is a recipient of the 2022 Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship, and their work has exhibited internationally including Kunsthal Charlottenborg (DK), Centre de Cultura Contemporánia de Barcelona (ES), Philadelphia Museum of Art (US), Science Gallery London (UK), Migros Museum of Contemporary Art (CH), Haus der Kulturen der Welt (DE), Jeu de Paume (FR), Museum of Contemporary Art Tuscon (US), Haus der elektronischen Kunst (CH), Institute of Contemporary Arts London (UK), Art Laboratory Berlin (DE), Akbank Sanat (TR), and Jogja National Museum (ID). They are a current member of the online network Hackteria: Open Source Biological Art, the laboratory theater collective Aliens in Green, the Asian feminist collective Mai Ling Vienna, as well as a contributor to the radical syllabus project Pirate Care and to the online Cyberfeminism Index.
ETHOS
My interdisciplinary practice is one of socio-political excavation, investigating the role of institutional science and biotechnology in the construction of somatic fictions and mass political imaginaries. Drawing upon the concept of public amateurism and Critical Art Ensemble’s notion of “fuzzy biological sabotage,” my practice manifests through public participatory workshops and biohacking as critical sites of care, knowledge production and collaborative queerings of the status quo. Through my hormone research of the last six years, I choose the molecular semiosphere and its micro-performativities as the starting point for culturally examining body and gender politics and the ever-increasing alienation of what we commonly believe (and mistake) to be eco-heteronormative. If these molecules are to be black boxes from which to be emancipated and demystified, non-institutional “freak science” protocols trigger the unearthing of the histories, origins and futures of our collective mutagenesis. As a product of this world that is permanently polluted and colonized by industrial toxicities and capitalist aims, I run with this urgency to figure new (xeno)feminist strategies that embody the radical porosity of human, non-human, and planetary. Cross-contaminations are indeed how we survive together. Purity is not an option!
CONTACT
MAGGIC IS ALWAYS BASED NOW/HERE LIKE A XENO-MOLECULE DRIFTING FOREVER FOREIGN TO ITS WHEREVER LOCALE SO PLEASE CONTACT THEM AT OOO.MAGGIC[AT]GMAIL.COM IF YOU WISH TO BE COLONIZED BY THEIR UNRULY PRESENCE ☠️
Mary Maggic (b. 1991, Los Angeles) is a nonbinary Chinese-American artist and researcher working within the fuzzy intersections of body and gender politics and capitalist ecological alienations. Based in Vienna since 2017, Maggic frequently uses biohacking as a xeno-feminist practice of care that serves to demystify invisible lines of molecular biopower. After completing their Masters at MIT Media Lab (Design Fiction), their project “Open Source Estrogen” was awarded Honorary Mention at the Prix Ars Electronica '17 in Hybrid Arts, and in 2019 they completed a 10-month Fulbright residency in Yogyakarta, Indonesia investigating the relationship between Javanese mysticism and the plastic pollution crisis. Maggic is a recipient of the 2022 Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship, and their work has exhibited internationally including Kunsthal Charlottenborg (DK), Centre de Cultura Contemporánia de Barcelona (ES), Philadelphia Museum of Art (US), Science Gallery London (UK), Migros Museum of Contemporary Art (CH), Haus der Kulturen der Welt (DE), Jeu de Paume (FR), Museum of Contemporary Art Tuscon (US), Haus der elektronischen Kunst (CH), Institute of Contemporary Arts London (UK), Art Laboratory Berlin (DE), Akbank Sanat (TR), and Jogja National Museum (ID). They are a current member of the online network Hackteria: Open Source Biological Art, the laboratory theater collective Aliens in Green, the Asian feminist collective Mai Ling Vienna, as well as a contributor to the radical syllabus project Pirate Care and to the online Cyberfeminism Index.
ETHOS
My interdisciplinary practice is one of socio-political excavation, investigating the role of institutional science and biotechnology in the construction of somatic fictions and mass political imaginaries. Drawing upon the concept of public amateurism and Critical Art Ensemble’s notion of “fuzzy biological sabotage,” my practice manifests through public participatory workshops and biohacking as critical sites of care, knowledge production and collaborative queerings of the status quo. Through my hormone research of the last six years, I choose the molecular semiosphere and its micro-performativities as the starting point for culturally examining body and gender politics and the ever-increasing alienation of what we commonly believe (and mistake) to be eco-heteronormative. If these molecules are to be black boxes from which to be emancipated and demystified, non-institutional “freak science” protocols trigger the unearthing of the histories, origins and futures of our collective mutagenesis. As a product of this world that is permanently polluted and colonized by industrial toxicities and capitalist aims, I run with this urgency to figure new (xeno)feminist strategies that embody the radical porosity of human, non-human, and planetary. Cross-contaminations are indeed how we survive together. Purity is not an option!
CONTACT
MAGGIC IS ALWAYS BASED NOW/HERE LIKE A XENO-MOLECULE DRIFTING FOREVER FOREIGN TO ITS WHEREVER LOCALE SO PLEASE CONTACT THEM AT OOO.MAGGIC[AT]GMAIL.COM IF YOU WISH TO BE COLONIZED BY THEIR UNRULY PRESENCE ☠️
