Shapeshifters: Bodies Like Water

Shapeshifters: Bodies Like Water honors the deep connections between the body, land, and queer wisdom. The strength of these connections manifests as the courage to separate from predetermined ideals of gender, to surrender and embark on a sacred journey of self-realization. Shapeshifters is a celebration of this journey.

Why do we focus on gender as the playground for liberation? To play with gender is to play with power, to actively shift the violent dynamics of colonization, white supremacy, and other systems of oppression that rely on seemingly unchangeable gender norms.

Buy The Book

The idea of this book arose during a nail painting lesson between two lifelong friends, Ira Baumgarten and Tom Toni Parker. Tom began exploring gender and dress in new ways and shared this version of himself with Ira.

These conversations about nail painting, dressing up but not leaving the house and preconceived ideas of masculinity led to Ira’s realization that Tom’s story — along with the stories of so many others today — needed to be heard.

It is the simple act of listening that can bridge wide channels between people. The book’s collaborative magic began when Ira called his mentee and friend, Jenny.

Reviews

‘Shapeshifters’ is a profound affirmation of exploring the territory beyond the gender binary. These diverse voices share parts of their journey in a warm hearted way and invite us to explore the meaning of gender in our lives. They say ‘we are here, we are proud, and we affirm our true selves.’ The accompanying artwork to each person’s words provides a unique visual embodiment of their spirit. While some say there are two universal unchanging genders that everyone fits neatly into, this book eloquently explodes that myth.

Van Cleary-Hammarstedt, Ph.D. Non-Violence Studies

“The Shapeshifters – Bodies Like Water” is a mesmerizing and transformative collection, a true living gallery that celebrates the fluidity of queer liberation. Every image and story invite you to move beyond labels and immerse yourself in the natural flow of identity, breath, and creativity. Revisiting its pages feels like rediscovering a new layer of life each time—I find myself in awe of the depth and insight that emerges with every look. This book is a powerful ode to the expansiveness of human expression, and its beauty will linger with you long after you close its cover.

Amanda Gloria Valdes
Global Yoga/Mediation Educator
Doula Community Advocate

“Shape Shifters is more than a book – like the captivating cover image, it is a portal into a place where we once again feel our natural connection to the earth, water, fire, and air, to ourselves in our truest, most authentic nature. While many books and films about non-binary people are set in rather gritty urban and electrified concrete settings, and often focus primarily on over-sexualized aspects of their lives, Shape Shifters takes a gentler, more holistic approach and helps us perceive the whole person, the entire lifelong, and often multi-generational, journey each of character takes to rediscover, reveal and revel in themselves in this poetic exposition of self. This book is not just for the gender-fluid reader – it is for all of us looking for a more authentic connection to ourselves that is rooted in the natural elements of this beautiful earth we all call home.”

Amy Hart, Photographer/Filmmaker
Creative Director – Amy Hart Studios

The Artists

Jenny Zander

Artistic Director, Body Artist & Photographer

My dad taught me that “A good painting breathes,” meaning not everything should be colored in. And now, this is how I paint people. I don’t want to engulf a person in paint, I want to accent their body. Through body art and photography, I try to reflect our many identities and movements. I create on skin because it’s art with a heartbeat. Showing people in all their varying abilities and rawness, existing in many ways.

www.jennyzander.weebly.com

Instagram: @jennyzander98

Gayatri Narayanan

Lead Writer, Grounding Practitioner & Featured Artist

I am a community healer, facilitator, ecologist, and dancer. I was raised in South India and am now held mainly in Minneapolis, Mni Sota Makoce. I am deeply invested in the body as our site of practice, imagination, and decomposition as we transform our world. How do we return our bodies to love and belonging through touch, movement, and culture building? I am pouring my love and work towards a world that is abolitionist and caste-free.

mallipumedicines@gmail.com

BakiBakiBaki Porter

History & Resource Writer & Featured Artist

I be BakiBakiBaki and I am a Twin Cities creative and abolitionist. You know my ancestors personally saw to it that I’d be Queer? Transgender too! They blessed me with not just Sight, but the ability to feel the absurdity of binaries. It’s one of the keys that makes all this shake! How do I know? Simple, I prayed and pray about it. My bloodline be Creole and Blackfoot. My bloodline is FILLED with prayer. Prayer. From me and my ancestors. When I’m writing, thats prayer.

Instagram: @aloverswar

Natalia Patiño

Featured Artist

My work centers our interdependence, our interconnectedness and our spirit. I believe that our collective liberation calls us to decolonize our perspectives and our relationships. I trained to be a doula and birth companion while working as a youth and immigrant rights organizer. I learned how crucial it is to support the mothers and birthing people in our families and communities. I became a community interpreter and translator to break down language barriers, and began supporting organizations to cultivate language justice in their work.

Instagram: @guanabanati

Rox Anderson

Featured Artist

Most folx call me Rox. I live on the contemporary homeland of the Dakota and Anishinaabe people, currently known as Minneapolis, MN with my partner, 2 pitbulls and some chickens. I’ve been an on-air DJ and radio host for 25 years with shows on KFAI and KRSM radio stations. My mom was a social worker spending a good portion of her career in child welfare. She helped a lot of families and saved kids from abuse and neglect, including me and my brothers. I truly do believe that vital, visible leaders of color make our communities stronger. I’m a CORE member of REP (Relationships Evolving Possibilities) where I work to support community members responding to emergent crises.

www.ourspacemn.com

Sharon Day

Featured Artist

I come from the people of the strong woods, Bois Forte, from the land of misty colored waters, land that birthed the Mississippi River. I come from people descended from the hole in the day, Bugonageshick. On the day I was born, my parents were harvesting wild rice. I am the Executive Director and one of the founder’s of the Indigenous Peoples Task Force. I am an artist, musician and writer. I am an environmental activist, leading over 23 Water Walks since 2011 to offer prayers for rivers including the Mississippi, the Missouri, the Ohio and the James River in Virginia.

www.indigenouspeoplestf.org

In my dream, I was walking down the new road on the reservation past the cemetery and into the village. I sensed something following me – something dark and ominous, huge like a dark storm cloud. But I was afraid to turn around to look.

Standing there was the man I had dinner with — smiling, handsome. What’s wrong, he said? You have to help me, something is chasing me, I said. I will but there will be a price…

What is the price to not be different? To not feel alone? Is it worth it?

Ro Lorenzen

Featured Artist

In high school, I dove head-first into the world of Computer Music and a universe of sonic possibilities became my muse. Through many years of trial and error, transformations of mental and physical wellness and identity, I have continued to pursue healing through art. In the practice of this work, I began working with artists who needed production and engineering mentorship to hone their skills and further elevate their creations. Through dedication to craft and perseverance, I have opened a recording studio and production house of my own, Rotoscope Recordings in the Twin Cities.

ro@rotoscoperecordings.com

Instagram: @rowithaslash

When I am fully I, me and mine,
I am forgetful, singsong and occasionally unruly
impatient with my time here, instead of
elsewhere, I tap, curl, pull and scratch
which is often intended to help, but also further
serves reminder that I am the only one tapping,
curling, pulling and scratching at the only
brain in a body in a room in a house that
once held home for many before me, perhaps
They were less lonely

Tom Toni Parker

Featured Artist & Associate Producer

I can look back at the many lives I’ve lived in 70 years, the Many selves I have embraced from the One I am. I am a poet, I am a musician, I am a crossdresser. I didn’t make my living by any of those things, but I don’t feel my Ph.D. and career as a university teacher are more who I am than the songs I play or the makeup and clothing I desire to wear on this given day. Who I am is in the next poem I write, the next song I sing, the next time I dress up in order to feel what? To feel right, to feel alive, to feel curious, to feel new, to surprise myself with what emerges, to express who I am.

Accessible To All

We want to make sure anyone who would
benefit from the experience of reading
and viewing SHAPESHIFTERS: BODIES LIKE WATER
have access to a copy.

Buy The Book

To receive a scholarship book, contact Publisher, Ira Baumgarten at: irabaumgarten@gmail.com.

$15

Accessible Price

$30

Retail Price

$60

Donor Price