Welcome!

I’m a media artist who is embracing collaborative modes of working (call for artistic collaboration here). I’m passionate about women’s issues, and currently exploring sexual agency through a series of audio-visual artworks entitled Euphoric Femme.

Euphoric Femme is inspired by sex-positive feminism and sacred sexuality. Through a social media platform, the artworks are created in collaboration with people who identify as women and who are exploring and reinventing sexual expression. Euphoric Femme aspires to politicize women’s sexual agency, facilitate women driven erotic celebration, and cross-pollinate art with well-being.

I invite you to collaborate (see below) and join the Euphoric Femme community (buttons in the right column).

Call for artistic collaboration:

If you identify as a woman and are interested in contributing to these artworks, and are of age of majority, please email me at euphoricfemme@gmail.com.  I will email you the submission information. Currently, there are two projects you can collaborate in as follows:

The first is Autoerotic Meditations, an ever-expanding online artwork comprised of sound and image contributions from co-creators. While self-pleasuring, women take a photo of themselves or record their sound. Women then ornamentalize their photo into a mandala-like image (such as the one in the top right corner of the screen) using a simple special effect. Or women may choose to submit a sound component, whereby I edit their sound into a meditative and harmonic composition. These form an online slideshow with soundtrack that can be seen here.

The second is Her Pleasure, Her Desire; Remix, a touring exhibition that premiered at Fleishman Gallery (Wonderworks), Toronto, in April 2011. It was exhibited once again in Toronto’s first Sex and Consciousness conference in the fall of 2011 (special thanks to Ontario Arts Council for their generous support). In the production of this collaborative artwork, various women create personal autoerotic video and audio recordings to be implemented as the source content for the installation. Her Pleasure, Her Desire; Remix comes alive through audience members who lie down and use a hand-held disk interface to remix the women’s recordings into reverberant sounds and kaleidoscopic imagery projected on the ceiling. Her Pleasure, Her Desire; Remix is an aniconic exploration in mediating inner erotic states. Here is a video document of the installation at Fleishman Gallery.

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Euphoric Femme happened to coincide with, and was initially developed through, graduate studies at OCAD University. The supporting thesis paper is posted here.  Euphoric Femme continues evolving!

About the project title: “Euphoric” is to suggest the heightened sensual state and mystical mystery of sexual pleasure, whereas “Femme” (the Old French word for woman) is chosen for its phonetic resonance with the word “Euphoric”.  I intend for “Femme” (also the popular definition for a feminine lesbian), to include anyone that identifies as a woman.

Many thanks for your interest!  Please feel free to email me if wish to discuss the project further: euphoricfemme@gmail.com

Teresa Ascencao, Artistic Director