soy-fed beef

2024

Live performance, water, painted soy milk cartons

​00:20:00

​​

Siew attempts to deplete 9 one-litre cartons of water within 20 minutes. At a certain point, the water stops flowing down his throat and starts flowing down his face.

Siew explores the connections between consumption, calculation and performances of masculinity, referring to cultural trends of tracking nutrient intake for fitness. Siew reflects on this contemporary obsession with minute control over our bodies; viewing the numericisation and rationalisation of food as an act of hypermasculine violence — what Foucault described as an “elaboration of the act”.

He alludes to agribusiness practices, where protein-rich soy feed fattens livestock more quickly and cheaply. Large amounts of stress is exerted on the land and body to produce slabs of soy-fed beef.

Performed live for Gesture Serialised (2024) over at Peace Centre, organised and curated by Yen Phang.