Cross-Pollination Theory

Name: Cross-Pollination Theory
Start: 2026-11-07T19:00:00.000+01:00
End: 2026-11-08T02:00:00.000+01:00
Location: Mediamatic

What if a mutated plant could alter human sexuality through its pollen?

Sparked by the "gay frog" conspiracy theories, this video and bio-installation flips genetic modification picturing a sci-fi future where plants bio-hack us to halt human overpopulation. Surrounded by uncanny, aggressively grafted bonsai installations, the work links suppressed botanical history with queer resistance, asking who really gets to control the code of life.

Cross-Pollination Theory explores the relationship between queerness, mutation, and the modification of living organisms. Taking the “gay frog” conspiracy theory that circulated in the United States during the 2010's as a starting point, it imagines a new plant species that emerges from contaminated land and develops pollen that supposedly alters human sexuality. The plant becomes a fictional form of “reverse GMO”: instead of humans modifying plants, the plant begins to modify humans, reversing the anthropocentric structure through which humans have historically managed and controlled other forms of life.

In this speculative world, the plant’s evolution serves as a form of ecological resistance against human environmental destruction. Suppressed by dominant institutions, knowledge of the plant finds a way to survive through conspiracy theories, questioning which forms of knowledge we accept as science and which we discard as myth.

Maya Erin Masuda

Her time-based and spatial narratives bring non-human subjects to the fore—ranging from synthetic skin to artificial milk and contaminated plants. In doing so, she sensually confronts the tech-driven biopolitical violence affecting both human and non-human life. Drawing from personal experiences with reproduction, hormonal therapy, and normativity, her work imagines trans-species solidarity as an act of resistance and care, positioning toxicity and inflammation as complex forces that redefine belonging beyond human-centered perspectives. Enlarge

Maya Erin Masuda - credits: Hayato Itakura -