Event Blog: Kathy High - "Waste Matters: You Are My Future"

            In exploring how we interact with bacteria inside and outside of the personal ecosystems of our own bodies, Kathy High’s exhibit “Waste Matters: You Are My Future” poses a powerful challenge to our societal aversion to bacteria, human waste, and dialogue about how objects subjected to extreme scrutiny, disgust, and artificial control can actually be understood to help us naturally maintain ourselves and our ecosystems. By focusing her exhibit on her struggle with Crohn’s Disease, an autoimmune disorder that I also struggle with, this exhibit brought attention to the incredible power of the seemingly taboo forces of “poop” and “good bacteria”. By personalizing her exhibit through reaching out to David Bowie for a sample of his feces to test as a unlikely match for a fecal transplant, Kathy High again spoke to my own personal experiences by appealing to my childhood through a shared rock idol. Overall, this exhibit spoke to me more than any other art exhibit I have ever seen, and I sincerely hope that Dr. High explores these issues further and continues to relay them in such a powerful, visceral way.

            

Through the presentation of human feces and bacteria as integral parts of our immune systems - part of a self-sustaining, natural cycle integrating materials that we classify as “gross”, “waste”, and “harmful” – in an artistic medium of video presentation, artistic depiction, and ceramic conceptual exhibition, High speaks to how internal imbalances in our personal biomes are a reflection of external imbalances in nature. This really resonated with me, as research into Crohn’s disease suggests that it is largely a phenomenon in places with aggressive public sanitation and public health infrastructures. Much of the way our Western culture views the world is highly and sweepingly categorical: shit is waste, bacteria is bad, and the less of it that we interact with in nature, the better and healthier our lives will be. However, as High points out, bacteria and feces play a huge role in both our own bodies and the environment, and can even potentially improve a Crohn’s disease patient’s quality of life through a fecal matter transplant. In transforming traditional forces of the unclean into natural forces that claim stake in the broader cycle of nature, High really transformed my perspective on something personally important to me and related it to issues that resonate deeply with my personal environmental awareness.

Here Dr. High poses as Bowie, imitating his famous "Heroes" 1977 album cover photograph. As an enthusiastic David Bowie fan, I could relate to her drive to reach out to the rock superstar and connect with her personal and musical inspiration. 

In addition to this conceptual presentation of the biological struggle of Crohn’s and its environmental connections, Kathy High also intertwines elements of personal and pop-culture connection by reaching out to her favorite musician, David Bowie, in an emotional appeal to provide her with a stool sample for a fecal transplant. Bowie fits none of the requirements – he is over the allowed age range, he has a troubled medical history, etc – but Dr. High isn’t asking solely for medical reasons. For her, the symbolism of asking another for his/her feces, and the infinite possibilities of a match, represent a world of possibilities that potentially connect her to her own personal idol. This had a very visceral effect on me, as I too am a larger-than-life David Bowie fan. I appreciate deeply her ability to connect this process of Crohn’s treatment to a sense of integration in human society and culture, whilst subtly reminding us that even David Bowie shits.

This video, posing the question "How perfect is your stool?", questions how people value their own waste in light of its potentially valuable and desirable medicinal and biological qualities. Is Bowie's stool any more perfect than Kathy's? Is mine any less perfect than yours? Reminiscent of "Blood Wars", this challenges our preconceived notions of what makes things superior, and "perfect". 

The letter High sent to Bowie. Although it did not, to my knowledge, receive a response, the symbolism is nonetheless powerful. 

Kathy High, the exhbit curator, and I posing for a selfie.