Marianna Simnett’s artistic practice includes film, installation, drawing, sculpture and performance. At the heart of her work is a preoccupation with the body, exploring the ways it is perceived and imagined. Simnett probes social and cultural norms to expose their fallibility. The bodies in her work are mutants, shapeshifting according to their desire, moving fluidly between transient states, creatures, organs, machines, and other imaginary beings. In her disturbing, fantastical stories, she invents worlds in which identities, genders and species are not already given but waiting to be found. The Bird Game (2019) is a deliciously dark fairy tale in which six children are seduced into playing a deadly game by a talking crow. The winner gets to transform into a bird and never have to sleep again. Birds are known for their remarkable ability to survive on little to no sleep, a phenomenon which scientists are trying to steal to keep humans awake for longer. The film takes place in a secluded mansion without adults, in which all the rooms are like different cavities of a sick brain. This brutal tale of childhood and transformation will infect your dreams and give you nightmares.