The idea first came to me while staring at my reflection and absolutely hating what I saw. As someone who has benefited from thin privilege all my life, I quickly recognized the absurdity of it. But that awareness didn’t make me feel any better. Because the problem wasn’t my weight.

It was the societal conditioning that teaches us to despise our bodies no matter how much it fit the “standard of beauty”. You’re too fat. You’re too skinny. You’re too short. You’re never allowed to be enough. Regardless of gender, everyone is subjected to it, but the pressure is especially suffocating for women.

As I sat with the irony of my own body shame, a strange thought crept in: If people literally worshipped my ass, would I feel better about my body?

Born from that insecurity, Asscent became a personal journey and an experiment in self-acceptance. The installation was a multi-sensory experience that satirized the absurdity of body shame. Through touch, scent, light, sound, and performance, it transformed literal ass worship into sacred ritual. Modeled after Japanese Shinto architecture and adorned with church prayer candles, the shrine blended spiritual aesthetics from Eastern, Western, and New Age traditions into a playful site of irreverent reverence.

At its center stood a sculpture molded from a cast of my own ass, enshrined as a sacred icon and satirical commentary. Participants could light incense in its honor, and daily meditations were held at the shrine (the performance art component), creating moments of peace and release while paying respect to a cheeky deity. The ritual became its own religion.

More than a surface-level call to “love yourself,” Asscent invited participants to shed the weight of shame and laugh while doing it. It celebrated the body, femininity, and the cosmic joke of shame itself.