​Plaything unites the seemingly incongruent concepts of childhood innocence and adult trauma to subvert ways of viewing, using, and perceiving the female body in Western culture. Integrating silicone with interdisciplinary methods, Ettema's unconventional self-portraiture employs elements of play, absurdity, and the surreal to critique our capitalist, heteropatriarchal culture. As flesh becomes object and object, flesh, Ettema challenges the ways in which women are viewed as playthings forced into categories, reduced to their elements, and obliged to shapeshift to fit the narrow spaces patriarchal society creates for them.

In this body of work, Ettema reimagines familiar toys such as a shape sorter and popcorn popper. These toys are intended to strengthen children’s problem-solving, visual-perceptual, and gross motor skills and become aware of their bodies and the body’s agency. Just as toys are made to serve specific purposes, so too are women’s bodies, as they are objectified within the broader social system. Patriarchy becomes embedded in the very fabric of everyday life, often unnoticed, as both children and adults internalize roles that shape and limit their perceptions of gender and power. As a result, women’s bodies come to be seen as a kind of game, a form of entertainment for the gaze and for the gratification of the spectator. Reclaiming her body amid fragmentation, Ettema navigates the boundary between body and object, blending absurdity with an invitation for empathy.