Genital Call

Multimedia Installation

“Genital Call” discusses a forced debate about privacy and the question for whom it must be preserved.

An open call initialized by Giegold & Weiß was asking for descriptions of the recipients’ own genitalia.

It was directed mainly at cis*sexuals in order to place those genitalia which are socially classified as „natural“ and „normal“ in a legal context and thereby exposing them to distortion caused by the shift of media.

Professional court sketch artists were commissioned to visually realize these descriptions. Visitors were welcome to add their own outlines to the court sketch artists’ interpretations.

The submitted texts were narrated by eleven speakers and are audible via headphones and visually realized in german sign language on screen.

The idea for “Genital Call“ originated from debates following lawsuits in England and Scotland, where – mostly quite young – people were sentenced to several years of imprisonment because they had not revealed their assigned birthgender and looks of their genitalia when meeting new (potential) partners.