The artist offers to take on the role of a surrogate and proposes that future parents use an app to monitor and control her behavior over a nine-month period. The parent would decide what she eats, what activities she undertakes, and what she reflects on—having full control over the body in which their child grows. The exhibition includes the video Surrogate App, showing a prototype of the app that parents would have access to, and The Intended Parents, which allows us to observe the range of emotions that future parents may feel toward the surrogate’s body.

Artists’ Statement:

This deeply personal work offers my body as physical, emotional, and conceptual surrogate for understanding reproduction and technology’s role in it. The act of becoming a remote control surrogate serves as a metaphor for the control we may soon hold through processes of genetic engineering, as well as the immediate infringement on our bodily autonomy enacted by the legislation of reproductive rights worldwide.

Working with a prospective parent, I followed the desire to perform this remote-control surrogacy through an intense process working with doctors, psychologists, fertility specialists, surrogates, doulas, midwives, and geneticists. It involved designing the Surrogate app, searching sperm donor databases, completing psychological evaluations and health exams, freezing embryos, talking with family, and ongoing correspondence with each other. Upon reaching a difficult moment where I was prevented from being a surrogate by the medical board, I expanded the work into a series of short films, performances, and installations that tell the story of what happened.

Surrogate App

The Surrogate iOS app consists of a parent and surrogate version. For the surrogate, the app syncs with an Apple Watch to automatically track data including heart rate, sleep, physical activity and step count, as well as self reported data including mood, meals, water intake and weight. A calendar feature allows the parent to view the surrogate’s calendar and schedule activities, tasks, and meals. A snapshot feature enables the parent to request a current snapshot, allowing them to view the surrogate’s immediate environment. A message feature enables and documents parent and surrogate conversation over the course of the pregnancy. A notes feature allows both to privately record their thoughts throughout the process. The visual design of the app references a digital notebook, departing from the slick tech aesthetic of current life tracking apps. While the app and performance began with a provocation of extreme control and surveillance, through the development process, the app became a tool for understanding an evolving and nuanced relationship.