Gestures and Inscriptions in Ceramics and Sound: A Combined STS, Queer Marxist and Artistic Research Approach to the Study of Reproductive Politics

Abstract

This exposition brings together Artistic Research, Science and Technology Studies and Queer Marxism to examine the gestural nature of reproductive politics. It argues for an expansive understanding of the gesture that extends well beyond the domain of the embodied gesture to include different registers and materialities of cultural and scientific inscription. Broadly, I explore reproductive politics not only as a question of reproductive health –of access and choice– but as the daily negotiation of the body’s value and legibility across communication, labour and political fields. By questioning -through artistic action- the inevitability of the economic and social conditions that devalue or invisibilise reproductive work, this article also elaborates on the gestural nature of artistic research as counter-institutional practice.