Shipyard (2022) Single channel high-definition video (color, sound), 4:33 minutes
"I am a Ship of Theseus / biological frame constantly taken apart and put back together / planks of being / technology, flesh, and signifiers ripped out / and hammered back into place / constantly morphing / I’m also a cyborg / composed of modular parts, appendages, tools / that never quite fit into a cohesive whole / I can be a shipbuilder sometimes / a programmer of my cyborg mainframe / but I am forever assailed, imbricated / oozing outwards
I play a guided meditation / but one line of it just brings anxiety / “Get in tune with your body” / I love grass on my legs / and bass in my bones / but what does it mean to embody something inconstant / what shall I connect to? / my shifting, ill-fitting husk of a body / my dick I can’t figure out if I want to cut off / my too-slow growing breasts / the height and jawline which turns wolfwhistles to ‘faggot’s / cyborg flesh chafing against metal
in the face / of identification as pale substitite / for being / I still know that I choose / much more than I am / I choose cum gutters peeking over sunken waistline / push-up bra / feigned naïvety / muffling hormones / baguette bag travel perfume hand cream / marlboro golds / hysteria bad sex / (failed) heroin chic / I choose as much as any woman / not born but becoming a woman / choosing a impotent sophist / chained to true love / being-towards-uterus / somehow for them it seems less exhuasting / do I just need to build my own phantasms / better complexes
Immaterial girls / immaterial boys / rhythm rocks my bones / and suddenly I’m just a conduit / a speaker reverberating / a head spinning / for a moment I put down my toolbox / step off the stage / must I be partial to feel whole"
kolya shields 