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Glitch as Queer Alchemy
The world demands homogeny through erasures of the past. History is told by white cishet men and we battle daily to remind them of our existence. Queer identities are now more prominent but what good is that in a digital dark age? While online we express ourselves more freely than before, the lack of a record will leave us lost to time.
I present a new body, an idealized version of myself merging with the earth. Glitch art is an alchemical process that allows me to explore the trans body, giving me tools to show a different mode of being. This brings an ability to see the shifting sands around me in a new light. My foot touches soil and I leave a print. My body will form back into the earth and take up a new role. While history may forget who I was and what I stood for, the earth will always hold record, reusing me for new purposes, feeding new life, and continuing the alchemy of my being.
This presentation will touch on my work as examples of the themes above.
Indigo Woolfrey
Indigo Woolfrey is a trans, neurodivergent glitch & digital media artist. Their/her work covers many subjects but focuses on gender through the lens of transness. Gender non-conformity and glitch offer them/her scepticism of world systems and lead them/her to deconstruct normative modes of being and artistic practice.
The artist has exhibited internationally in Boston CyberArts, Institut de Francais, Croatia, and across Ireland. Their/her work was published in Circa Magazine, and used in live digital performance as part of SUSTAIN at Smock Alley Theatre.
Their/her art is influenced by Ian Keaveny and his investment in accessibility in glitch, Mark Klink and his glitching of 3D objects, Ras Alhague and their corruptions of their body, and Queer Ecology.
Their/her recent work uses alchemy as a metaphor for transition, whether that be in gender or the need for it in the world. It asks the question: “If you could change your body at will, would your thinking be so rigid?”
