For angels of a drowning world, Lío invited photographer Wynne Neilly to join them in a three-day excursion to the Bombay Beach Biennale, a renegade arts festival set in a partially abandoned desert town on the shores of a manmade, toxic lake called the Salton Sea. The two entered the lake, Wynne with protective gear and Lío without, and together, they created both a durational performance piece for those passing by, as well as a series of images that propose a synergy between the fight for body autonomy and the fight to protect against climate collapse.

The series’ classical art motifs hearken to the ancient history of gender nonconforming bodies that has been left out of the western-colonial archive. The contradiction between the aesthetic beauty of the images and the actual toxicity of the environment mirrors the precarity of being an American today.