CAROLINE MCMANUS

SUPERFETATION is a mixed media installation composed of the following elements:

WATER
FOUND OBJECT
Ikea pod chair.
AUTONOMOUS ROBOT:
Robotic goldfish.
TRASH, RESIN
GLAD ForceFlex trash bags cast in resin and plastic fish transport bag.
NETWORKED IMAGES ON TILE: 

Stills from the 1988 film, “Baby M”. This film is based on a controversial case wherein a gestational laborer, Mary Beth Whitehead, was denied parenthood rights and portrayed as a hysterical, trashy woman in the media. In her bold feminist performance, Born to be Sold: Martha Rosler Reads The Strange Case of Baby $/M, Martha Rosler counters this narrative, which I aim to build off of in this work.

Superfetation is a second conception during pregnancy, which causes the womb-bearer to carry two, differently-aged embryos, growing parallel to one another. In a spectacular real-life case in the United States, a hired surrogate laborer, carrying what she thought were twins, learned upon giving birth that this was not the case at all. In fact, one child, which she thought had been an implanted embryo, was actually her own child, conceived with her partner. She immediately recognized the child as hers, yet she was required to relinquish both children: the contract she signed meant that her child was no longer her “property”.

As the surrogacy industry stands, both the working bodies and the born bodies become property. In the United States, the nuclear family structure produces, reproduces and protects property. Currently, the demand for surrogacy services among the global middle class is exploding at the same time that the nuclear family structure absorbs all demands that would otherwise be provided by community-centered care, and/or a functional welfare state.

This work utilizes the symbol and phenomenon of superfetation to explore themes related to the acceleration of consumption culture, private property, and bodies-as-property in a near-dystopian future accelerated by climate change.