It is a performative piece about taking on someone else’s identity through sharing their gut microbiome via a FMT. Photographs were offered to David Bowie in exchange for a poop sample. The offer was never completed as Bowie died in 2016.

Looking at research in fecal microbial transplants and gut biomes to better understand the important function of bacteria in our bodies, this project embraces metaphors of interspecies love. As a patient with Crohn’s disease, High’s interest in gut microbiota starts with her own body.

Photographer: Eleanor Goldsmith