Isabella Covert
Catheter Infiltration (Coagulation), 2025
Nylon, latex, IV bag
7" x 23" x 5"
Anagen Tube, 2025
Nylon, latex, medical tubing, artist hair
16" x 23"
Contours of a Leaking Body (Fluid Infusion), 2025
Nylon, latex, IV pole, breathing simulator
44" x 65" x 78"(variable)
Permeating a paradoxical allure with materials like latex and hair, my work serves as a surrogate for the body and the afflictions of bodily containment. I work in a space of untangling entrails, of autopsying contradictions. Shedding my skin, peeling blisters, picking scabs, and excreting the self, I scratch at the relationship of the body and the structural tendencies they exist in.
These forms challenge the biopolitics of bodies as subordinated vessels for collective future, suggesting an alternative posthuman relationship between power and reproduction. Prodding at feminist posthuman potentialities of the body, she investigates liberation within synthetic biologies. The decisions we make now determine who and what we are becoming, who has the authority to determine how human developments are distributed, and how technological advancements can restructure liberation.
In a highly curated era, work that challenges is buried in algorithmic structures that determine what is released and consumed. Existing as both real and virtual entities, the line that deciphers the divide between individual and collective minds is melded. Existing and creating in a liminal space of nuance, we can document the mind in this era of discourse and overwhelm. I understand my work as thoughts that are never fully developed, and that’s a good thing.
- Isabella Covert