CHAIRS: Roberta Buiani and Nina Czegledy

ArtSci salon is proud to present two events exploring the entangled issues of sex and sexual fantasy, sexual reproduction and sexual regulation, fertility and sexual technologies. We invited artists and scholars to address these themes using their preferred approach: the result is a thought provoking series which interrogates and imagines these issues through human/non-human sexual fantasies, interrogates them by means of modified gynaecological instruments, rewrites potential scenarios as enhanced and/or elderly humans, or offers unexpected ways to hack sex right here, right now.

The first event of the series interrogates pleasure, pornography and sexual representation online and in performative contexts.

Our goal is not just to imagine how media, technological enhancement, gene editing and medical treatments will transform our idea of sex and our sexuality as human beings and as part of the wide non-human world that surrounds us. It is also to think of how creative/critical initiatives may facilitate a sustained dialogue to help us cope with unresolved issues in the present. Interdisciplinary so!

The two events will be accompanied by an exhibition on display Oct 18-Nov.8 in the Koffler Students Centre Cabinets, University of Toronto

Our Special guests will be
Susanna Paasonen
and
Teresa Ascencao

Speaker Bios

Susanna Paasonen is professor of media studies at University of Turku, Finland. With an interest in studies of sexuality and the internet, she is the author of Carnal Resonance: Affect and Online Pornography (MITP 2011), Many Splendored Things: Thinking Sex and Play (Goldsmiths Press 2018) and Not Safe for Work: Sex, Humor, and Risk in Social Media (with Kylie Jarrett and Ben Light, MITP forthcoming).

Teresa Ascencao is a multimedia artist whose work toys with social constructs of body language, costume, and inner corporeal experiences. Her folk and pop inspired artworks employ concept-related mediums and technologies that invite audiences to play with iconographies and scenarios involving gender, seduction, consumption, and class.
Teresa was born to Azorean parents in Sao Paulo, Brazil and immigrated to Canada at a young age. Her artworks, such as “Her Pleasure, Her Desire, Remix,” and “Consuming Her”, have been exhibited widely in Canada and internationally.

SPONSORS:

ArtSci Salon thanks the Fields Institute and the Ontario Brain Institute​​​​​​​
 

LASER (Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous) Talks is Leonardo's international program of evening gatherings that bring artists and scientists together for informal presentations and conversations. LASER Talks were founded in 2008 by Bay Area LASER Chair Piero Scaruffi and are in over 30 cities around the world. To learn more about how our LASER Hosts and to visit a LASER near you please visit our website. 

The mission of the LASERs is to provide the general public with a snapshot of the cultural environment of a region and to foster interdisciplinary networking.