Growing up in the Mormon religion, a particular analogy was used as a teaching mechanism for sexual purity. The analogy was as followed:
“If you have sex before marriage, you’ll be a piece of chewed gum.
No man will want to chew on a piece of gum that’s already been chewed.”
This analogy was specifically given to the female youth to emphasize the importance of preserving their virginity for marriage. Typically, the instructor would pass out pieces of gum for the girls to chew on while contemplating the lesson. In the Mormon religion, sexual activity outside of marriage is regarded a sin only second to murder. For the LDS youth, the eternal stakes are high to remain abstinent.
The sculpture is a cultural critique on the misogyny I personally experienced growing up in the LDS church. According to this paradigm, women are not people. Women are inanimate objects: a piece of gum. An object to be enjoyed and consumed by a man. An object of pleasure and desire. She is not someone who thinks, someone who feels, or someone who chooses. Her identity, her worth, her destiny, her salvation are all reduced to her sexual organ: the vagina.
Consequently, this is a sculpture of a vagina, not a woman. The vagina is made entirely of chewed gum, chewed by me. The surrounding thighs and torso are covered with gum wrappers.
Chewed Gum 2021
sculpture (duct tape, plastic bags, paper-mache, chewed gum, gum wrappers, skirt)
Chewed Gum 2021 Detail
sculpture (duct tape, plastic bags, paper-mache, chewed gum, gum wrappers, skirt)