This project reimagines the composite deity Ardhanarishwar, the sacred union of Shiva and Kali, as a hyperreal reflection of my own XXY body. With broad shoulders, a flat chest, a feminine waist, and long legs, my form already blurs categories, and this self-portrait turns that genetic duality into divine expression. Styling and digital layering became a ritual of collapse between opposites, where myth, gender, and technology fuse into one figure.

Embodying Ardhanarishwar through my XXY body was both vulnerable and transcendent. It allowed me to see my chromosomal difference not as anomaly but as power. an inheritance of both masculine and feminine energies at once. In that moment, standing half-Shiva, half-Kali, I felt the body that often confuses others revealed as sacred, fluid, and hyperreal. my own divinity mapped through genetics and myth.

Styling, creative direction & production by Aayush Anima Aggarwal

Photographer - Kit Ling