Strange Love

Completed during the Master of Design program at Emily Carr University of Art + Design

For many species in the non-human animal kingdom, sex and mating rely on pretty simple factors — like which suitor has the biggest feather display or which can perform the more compelling mating dance. Us humans, on the other hand, have managed to complicate it quite a bit; adding layer upon layer of symbolism and emotion, making an already complex sex drive even more complex. 

Strange Love is an installation designed specifically to remind us of these animal origins, asking a viewer to reconsider what we’ve deemed as sexually weird or strange and why. The work consists of ten slightly reflective panels, each displaying one animal-mating fact in black lettering. The medium allows the viewer to slightly see their reflection, creating a link between the human and the mating fact they’re reading about.

Of course this collection isn’t at all about the behaviours themselves or that we should do what the animals do. Its purpose is to ask an individual to reflect upon what it is we consider normal sexual behaviour and how we’ve grown to assume and align with those sexual norms.