Created by the Beyond Opposition research team, Imperfect Utopias is an online exhibition that breaks new ground in reimagining divisions around sexuality, gender and abortion.

When it comes to recent social change, what happens when we meet people we fundamentally disagree with on key issues like gender, sexuality or abortion? In these encounters, how do we relate to those we disagree with? If we had to imagine a Utopia, is there a space in it for those we disagree with? These are some of the questions viewers of a new online exhibition created by the Beyond Opposition research team at UCD were asked to consider.

Imperfect Utopias is based on a series of three workshops held in 2023 in Dublin, Vancouver and Glasgow. The exhibition uses creative methods to explore difference and opposition on the topics of sexuality, gender and abortion. Marrying interactive design with playful sounds and imagery, it presents insights from the workshops and poses questions and challenges for viewers.

Each workshop was created with an artist in a different medium to facilitate a small group of people with a range of different positions related to gender, sexuality and abortion to make art together for the exhibition. The art forms used were: visual and abstract art in Dublin with artist and researcher Leah Hillard; music and sound in Vancouver with interdisciplinary artist, musician and researcher Gillian Stone; and theatre in Glasgow with Karen McGrady-Parker, Kat Wilson and Fraser MacLeod of Culture Junction. Subsequently, the research team worked with these and other artists to transform the workshops into an online exhibition, incorporating verbatim text, images, video, sound and graphic art.

Beyond Opposition is a European-funded research project interested in social divisions around genders, sexualities and abortion. The project seeks to move “beyond opposition” in the face of increasing social polarisation in Ireland, Great Britain and Canada. It considers how recent social and legal changes to sexual and gender rights impact different people within these countries.

Principle Investigator Dr Kath Browne said, “‘Beyond Opposition’ seeks to explore how we might live together when we hold fundamentally different positions that may not change. In this way, it seeks to address the divisions that can become increasingly fraught, politicised and define our lives. The exhibition is one output of the research and aims to offer people a chance to explore how workshop participants engaged with this question, and to put themselves in this space and think how they might act, and what they could do.”

Much essential current research emphasises ways of securing legal, policy and social measures to protect the rights and equalities of minoritised groups, including LGBTQ+ people and those in need of abortions. However, research less frequently looks at divisions that may persist or even grow, nor identifies ways to live with difference.

Dr Carol Ballantine, post-doctoral researcher and exhibition co-curator, said. “We hope that through the use of different artistic approaches, this exhibition will enable people to think about a familiar topic in new, surprising and hopeful ways.”

In Dublin, participants worked with artist and researcher Leah Hillard, whose practice combines textiles and spoken word. Using conversation, colour, materials and texture, over the course of the day, the participants explored society and connection. A number of artistic activities culminated in the collective creation of an applique tablecloth representing imagined utopias where we do not agree.

Leah reflects on the significance of the arts-based activities: “Working with their hands allowed participants to stay with the conversation and listen even when the conversation was hard.” You can explore their art and conversations here.

For Vancouver, the researchers worked with interdisciplinary artist, musician and researcher Gillian Stone to develop sound and music-based activities for Canadian participants. Participants drew sounds, engaged with soundscapes, created graphic scores, and collaboratively made an original sound piece together. These activities were designed to allow participants to explore ways of imagining worlds where we may never agree through music and sound-based processes. You can listen to these sound-based activities on the website.

In Glasgow, participants engaged in drama exercises devised by Culture Junction that directed them to think about character, language, voice and movement to collectively imagine future spaces and interactions living with division. As Culture Junction’s Fraser reflects: “Acting is about being able to see the world through other eyes, and that’s what then opens up and allows the ability to imagine other worlds, where no is not an option, it’s ‘yes, and?’ and you always add to it.”

The utopian spaces imagined by the participants in the workshops have been creatively developed by comic artist Tim Fish into a suite of three inspiring comic strips for the Glasgow section of the Imperfect Utopias exhibition.

Dr Andrew McCartan, postdoctoral researcher leading on the Glasgow workshops and exhibition, said: “Tim’s comics not only allow you to see the spaces imagined by our participants, they invite you into them, to immerse yourself into these worlds and reflect on how you would feel if these utopias become your reality when we cannot change each other’s minds.”

With this exhibition and other initiatives, the Beyond Opposition project breaks new ground in thinking about polarisations related to gender, sexuality and abortion. Imperfect Utopias provides a fun and challenging opportunity for audiences to explore their own relationship with these topics, and the divisions that arise in their day-to-day lives.

To see the full Imperfect Utopias exhibition, click here.