The Leaky Female Body
The Leaky Female Body project was largely inspired by Julia Kristeva’s Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. The use of body fluids within feminist performance art brings the interior of the body outward, proclaiming the body’s existence. Kristeva explains, “I expel myself, I spit myself out, I abject myself within the same motion through which "I" claim to establish myself.” Order, identity, and systems are all disrupted.
Feminist performance artists have utilized body fluids and DNA within their work for decades, and they have made profound contributions to both art and feminist histories. Many of these works are left out of the traditional Western art historical canon. The Leaky Female Body is an archival research project created with the help of mentor Micol Hebron. Daskas also created a series of performative self portraits in conjunction with her findings. Desert Portrait (2020), Subverting the Cube (2020), Blood Collage (2020), and Spit Collage (2020) all reconcile with the exclusivity of art history and issues of violence against women while, at the same time, also paying tribute to pioneering feminist artists.
The full project website can be found here.Blood Collage (2020)
Desert Portrait (2020)
Subverting the Cube (2020)
Spit Collage (2020)