Feminism, Grief, and Politics: The Mosquito is Dead by Hannah Höch 

Hannah Höch. The Mosquito is Dead. 1922. Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin. Photography by Robert LaPrelle, Kimbell Art Museum.

By Alexandra Hulsey 

Did you know that all mosquitoes that bite are female? It feels unfair. Something so annoying, invasive, and evil… shouldn’t be a woman. We wouldn’t bite, rage, and feed off blood like that—unless we had a reason. But even then, well-earned. 

Hannah Höch painted The Mosquito is Dead in 1922, right in the murky middle between World War I and World War II. It’s a strange, uncanny painting—surreal, uncomfortable, poking at something it never fully names. Höch made it after her breakup with Raoul Hausmann, a fellow Dadaist and, frankly, a classic early-20th-century art-world misogynist. So naturally, people interpret the work as a breakup painting. 

Is the mosquito him? A bloodsucking, lingering nuisance finally dealt with? Or is it her? 

Here’s why I question it: the mosquito isn’t squashed. It’s not a splatter on a wall, not a curled-up carcass stuck to someone’s ankle. It’s laid out, stomach-down, all legs intact, splayed gently like a pinned specimen or a creature that simply… stopped. In real life, mosquitoes often don’t die of natural causes. We end them. They get slapped, swatted, smeared. So, how did this one die? Did it starve? Fall from the air? Give up? 

While I’ve never been a mosquito’s first choice, I’ve still been bitten by them in my past. I know what it’s like to be drained, to carry the echoes of something that ended badly. The Mosquito is Dead feels like a soft allude to that: something dead but not resolved. A kind of quiet violence. A grief that hums instead of screams. Not unlike the undercurrent of the rise of fascism and, in turn, the Second World War. 

To the left of the mosquito sits an hourglass—but it’s doing something bizarre. Sand fills the top half, while the bottom curves into a downward concave shape. There, Höch suggests a faint sense of movement with a delicate, wispy brushstroke. Gravity has gone off-script. The sand clings to the sides like glue, dripping with eerie slowness. It makes me think of how time feels after trauma: suspended, disobedient, looping. Höch’s hourglass doesn’t measure time—it resists it. It longs to undo something. To rewind.

At the center stands a small, jointed figure. It resembles a drawing mannequin, but the longer you look, the less certain that becomes. It’s standing stiffly on a pedestal atop a circular base, its limbs angular and awkward: one leg steps forward, its torso twists to face us, and its head tilts at a sharp angle. One arm is bent behind its back; the other might be raised or abstracted entirely. It’s as if the body is trying to perform something expected of it, but doesn’t quite know how. Maybe the mannequin is a stand-in for how women are expected to perform, contort, and behave under pressure. Stiff but delicate. Controlled. 

The Mosquito is Dead isn’t just about personal heartbreak—it’s layered atop an unravelling world.

To the right of the mannequin, a bare tree juts up, its few branches impaling three large leaves. To the left, a thin black flag hangs on a tall pole. The tree doesn’t offer shelter or growth—it feels surgical and barren. The black flag isn’t waving. It’s more of a quiet signal of grief, or warning, or resignation. 

This is where Höch’s genius hits hardest. The Mosquito is Dead isn’t just about personal heartbreak—it’s layered atop an unravelling world. The personal and the political fold into one another. The painting doesn’t solely depict ‘loss’, it distorts the very tools we use to measure and explain it. Time, posture, symbols—all slightly off. 

Höch’s mosquito might be more than just a bug: Maybe it’s her ex, maybe it’s the patriarchy, maybe it’s history itself. All I know is she lets it die its own death. She leaves it whole. And that feels important. 

Höch was later included in the Nazis’ 1937 Degenerate Art exhibition, where her work was mocked as immoral, un-German, and dangerous. And yet—she kept making it. She kept pointing out how gender, war, and nationalism are tangled in the same systems of control. Her art was never safe. It was never meant to be. 

The Mosquito is Dead doesn’t yell. It murmurs. It lingers. It’s grief that won’t resolve, wounds that refuse to close. It’s about endings that don’t truly end. And that rings timely and true now. 

The Mosquito is Dead is currently on view at the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, as part of Modern Art and Politics in Germany, 1910–1945, an exhibition that traces how German artists responded to one of the most volatile eras in modern history. The show runs through June 22, 2025.

Eternally Shadow-Banned

On Bodies Being Bodies and Confronting the Algorithm

Jada, Unraveling Series 2023.Photo series sponsored by Bonjibon.

By Taylor Neal

I have always been fascinated by bodies and the natural beauty of bodies being bodies interacting with the world.

I grew up as a dancer, which connected me intimately at an early age to the complexities and nuances of different bodies through all stages of life—the ways that youthful bodies move, how these movements change as we age, and the influence of one’s own lived experience on their relationship to their body.

As a student, I became fascinated by fashion and costume and how garments and manipulations of shape and silhouette can alter and interpret bodies—how one’s background, location, and lived experience can influence one’s relationship to their body.

This ongoing fascination led me to photography, to the capturing of bodies in stillness. I have worked in this medium now for over a decade.

Taylor Neal. Jolene (2), Unraveling Series, 2022. Photo series sponsored by Bonjibon.

On Bodies Being Bodies

Through photography, I strive to capture natural relationships between the human subject and the natural world and to emphasize that we are a part of nature, not apart from nature. I refer to my art as an exploration of free beauty, a concept derived from Kantian philosophy, specifically Kant’s Critique of Judgement. Kant defines free beauty as “the experience of beauty rests on what he calls a harmony, or a free play of the faculties of imagination and understanding, punctuated by pleasure. Notably, this free play is supposed to be without a concept.[1]

Kant’s notion of free beauty arrives when we notice a harmony between imagination and understanding, based in pleasure, without predisposition. In our world, we are so often influenced by what we are told is beautiful, what we are allowed to regard as beauty, that we’ve become disconnected from our natural noticing of beauty that resides in the human form. The body is beautiful in a way that we can instinctively perceive. My work seeks to remind us of the free beauty in all of our natural forms.

When we are only able to witness uncensored bodies in sexualized contexts, our detachment from free beauty is extended.

As a queer, femme photographer, I use photography to explore bodily beauty beyond the dominant narratives attached to bodies in media. My work aims to depict genders from a compassionate, intimate perspective, to capture the body in its most natural form in spaces that allow for consent and safety. As most of us working artists in 2024 must, I use social media—primarily, Instagram—to share my work and connect with like-minded communities. The problem, then, is striving to find a respectful balance between maintaining the integrity of my art and mission and satisfying the censorship algorithms that rule these platforms.

Taylor Neal. Strawberry Moon, 2021.

The Algorithm

There are many reasons why these platforms censor and silence bodies. Oversimplified arguments for online censorship are often predicated on maintaining a platform free of sexual content, purportedly to address concerns related to the age of consent. The problem with this practice is that to censor the nude body, especially the femme body, is to link the body inherently with sexuality.

By censoring only certain parts of the body, the genitals and female-coded nipples, the natural body is deemed an inherently sexual image. The body then, is deemed something to be hidden away and ashamed of, where only specific depictions of bodies are acceptable for the platform.

Female-coded nipples are permitted on the platform only within the context of breastfeeding; genitals only concerning birth or as depicted by sculpture or painting. Censors and algorithms decide whether or not, and in what ways, bodies are worthy of being seen. The nipples of femme people are only acceptable if in relation to motherhood, but not by their own autonomous choice.

When we are only able to witness uncensored bodies in sexualized contexts, our detachment from free beauty is extended. In a world that routinely links one’s worth as a human to their sexual desirability, to have our bodies policed in this manner is a constant reminder that our bodies are not our own. Furthermore, in the categorizing of certain bodies as exclusively sexual, and the deeming of the sexual as explicit and subject to censure, our sexuality is silenced. The free beauty inherent in our bodies is silenced.

The western world has suffered for generations from sexual repression. We finally have tools such as social media to generate information, conversation, and education about our bodies, our pleasure, and sexuality, and yet we must use silly type tricks such as “seggs” and “m@sturbation” for these conversations not to be erased on social media— these conversations that have the power to save lives. These censures and erasures also have an outsized impact on sex workers striving to navigate the drastically changing ways of reaching clients and going about their work. Anything outside the lens of acceptability constructed by the platform authorities and algorithms is automatically deemed dirty.

I do the work that I do, to directly confront this silencing.

Taylor Neal. Bri, Unraveling Series, 2023. Photo series sponsored by Bonjibon.

The Silencing

In addition to the many barriers my work faces due to my position as a queer femme photographer, this policing of bodies makes it even more challenging to share my art, which strives to approach the widely experienced trauma of body-based censorship in the western world. My refusal to delete my art from Instagram to satisfy the algorithms means that I am eternally shadow-banned on the platform, which makes expanding my audience next to impossible on the app. Their message: surrender to our guidelines or get lost.

My profile on Instagram aims to be a space where people can come to feel seen, validated, and reminded of their inherent beauty, regardless of what barriers and limitations their body has faced. When I share my other work as a sex educator and writer on the platform, offering access to sex education and conversation on topics of the body, queerness, and sexuality, I face additional censure and silencing.

Even within the policing of bodies in general, there are bodies that face greater barriers than others. I am a white, thin, able-bodied femme living in Canada. Even though I am constantly censored, I still hold privilege in spaces such as Instagram. It is important to note that when I post photos of my own body, these photos are less likely to be flagged or removed than when I post photos of fat bodies, disabled bodies, bodies of colour, queer bodies, and aging bodies. I have learned these facts through experiments with my own social media.

Whenever I mention sex work, I am silenced.

When the sex worker happens to use substances, it is silenced even faster.

Whenever I show body hair, I am silenced.

When that body hair is on a body of colour, it is silenced even faster.

Whenever I show fatness, I am silenced.

When that fatness is showing signs of aging, it is silenced even faster.

Whenever I show intimacy between lovers, I am silenced.

If that intimacy is queer, it is silenced even faster.

Bodies existing outside of what is deemed palatable receive fewer likes, and significantly less views, based on what the algorithm allows to appear on Explore pages within the Instagram app, and often appear on my “restricted content” list. Videos of myself dancing also appear on my “restricted content” list if I dare to touch my body erotically, as though my body is not mine to touch and share how I please. 

The “restricted content list” is a relatively new feature on Instagram, where you can see  a list of which of your posts have been flagged as problematic and why. This list of posts is then used as evidence for “why a profile can’t be recommended,” which means that no matter what hashtags you use or how good your content is, your posts will never come up on anyone’s feed unless they search you specifically. This is harmful for people using this platform for business and for artists striving to share their work and build an audience, because gaining followers and having your content seen is difficult if the algorithm is blocking it from going anywhere. The only way to fix this so that your profile can be seen is to either contest the flagging (which usually doesn’t change anything) or remove the posts that are named “problematic” and wait for the algorithm to re-evaluate your profile.

Taylor Neal. Mosco, Unraveling Series, 2022. Photo series sponsored by Bonjibon.

F*ck The Algorithm

And yet, we simply cannot stop sharing.

We need to see ourselves, our bodies, in the spaces we have access to, not gate-kept behind entrance fees, in art galleries, or on porn websites, run by the same powers controlling our algorithms. In creating a space online dedicated to the expression of free beauty, my intention is to remain available and accessible as a means of safety and support in our collective journey toward reclaiming our bodies, regardless of how the shadow-bans minimize my audience.

I continue to find new and creative ways to share my work within the criteria, and yet I feel a little pang of frustration each time I airbrush the nipples from my photos. Free beauty is meant to refer to the lack of concept, or imposed standard of meaning, and yet to cover nipples is to implicate inherent meaning upon them. But, this platform is what we’ve got for now by way of accessible art dissemination, and so I find ways to share more authentic versions of my work elsewhere, and use Instagram to re-direct folks there. Because we cannot stop doing this work, creating this art, pushing back against the hegemonic standard of acceptable beauty with the bold realness of how it actually looks to be human.

We cannot stop finding beauty in the crevices of the rocks, the way the juice of the pomegranate mirrors the body, and the folds of our skin. Our connection to nature is where free beauty is found, and this unfiltered, raw, organic beauty is the essence of what makes us human. We cannot stop sharing the authentic experience of our bodies, their nuances, and their unique interpretations of life, because we cannot stop expressing our humanity. We cannot stop creating spaces for safety, recognition, and representation. We find ways to work together within the algorithm and to beat it at its own game by using type tricks and blurring our images, or we grind against it together.

So, uplift your favourite artists and share their work. Notice the patterns you see in the algorithms and work to confront them. Call it out when you sense wrongness, in the words of Sara Ahmed.[2]

We must not stop sharing, even if we are eternally shadow banned, because even when it feels hopeless, someone will stumble upon your page and feel seen by your art.

This feature can be found in our third print issue with the theme of Censorship. You can find a copy here.

[1] Kant, I. . The Critique Of Judgement. (1790).

[2] Ahmed, S. . Living A Feminist Life. (Duke University Press, 2017).

Labour Care: A Poem & Conversation with Camila Salcedo

Photo of Labour Pains curated by Emma Steen for Mayworks Festival of Working People and the Arts at Workers Arts & Heritage Centre. Photo by Carolyn Combs.

By Kalina Nedelcheva

Labour Pains, an exhibition curated by Toronto-based curator and writer Emma Steen for Mayworks Festival of Working People & the Arts 2024 at Workers Arts and Heritage Centre, takes the body of the precarious worker as a starting point. Within the context of a capitalist system that approaches the body as a tool to be exploited in the name of profit — where accessibility and support often come as an afterthought or are completely ignored — the body is in constant danger of breaking down. Labour Pains surveys the challenges workers with varying needs and abilities face while accessing healthcare. Steen brings artists Camila Salcedo, Peter Morin, and Sean Lee and Birdie Gerhl together to explore the uncertainty of freelance employment, Indigenous relations to healthcare, disability, accessibility, and Crip Politics. The exhibition frames healthcare as a labour rights issue while shedding light on the sinister capitalist and social structures that prevent healthcare from being accessible for all.

The following interview is an experimental conversation with multi-disciplinary artist Camila Salcedo who contributed a series of care objects to the exhibition. Through a series of conversations with artists and cultural workers who have experienced serious brain injuries, Camila reimagines homemade remedies through a creative lens. While the objects figure as acts of care from one precarious worker to another, they also touch upon the risk of healthcare privatization for freelance artists and the financial strain unexpected illnesses or injuries can have on the precarious body. Drawing inspiration from the artist’s playful approach to guiding attention to bodily ails under capitalism, the interviewer paired each question with a poetic verse that reflects and responds to Camila’s practice and the ethos of Labour Pains in general.

Camila Salcedo. taking care: brain injury stories (2024). Photo by Kafayé Clarke. Image courtesy of the artist.

stone-walled to

hear my thoughts;

misshapen and delirious,

though, still here;

at least they’re still here;

What has been your experience with the healthcare system?

Camila: I’ve noticed that doctors don’t have a lot of time and often, you have to advocate for yourself a lot within the healthcare system. Nurses and other types of healers — like massage therapists and chiropractors — have been angels in my experience because they pay attention to the emotional aspects of health issues; they’ve treated me more like a human being whereas oftentimes doctors just want you in and out. Doctors want you to get better as quickly as possible so you can return to the capitalist lifestyle.

It is apparent to me how little mental health supports exist to guide one in dealing with the healthcare system. It is not very holistic. I’ve also had drastically different experiences, depending on whether I was covered by insurance or not at the time of my visit. When you don’t have insurance, it is more difficult to navigate the system.

It is apparent to me how little mental health supports exist to guide one in dealing with the healthcare system.

Emotional support and mental health integration in the healthcare system is necessary and should be a priority. Recently, I’ve been reading a few books — one of which is The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture by Gabor Maté — that point out how stress can cause different types of illnesses and issues to the body. There is a huge correlation between experiencing stress and the efficacy of healthcare that is missed.

keep working, still working

still working, keep working;

I feel my body rumble

because of the intensity but

my thoughts are calm;

they must be calm.

Camila Salcedo. taking care: brain injury stories (2024). Photo by Kafayé Clarke. Image courtesy of the artist.

How do you embody the precarity freelance workers experience in the healthcare system through your art?

C: I am an artist who is in a precarious situation and that seeps into my work because when I don’t have funding, I am unable to make the work. That in itself is part of my process. The pieces I made for Labour Pains also touched on this. I interviewed three individuals —  musician and facilitator Carmel Farahbakhsh, curator and educator Patricia Ritacca, and musician and media artist Katie Kotler — who’ve had brain injuries in different capacities. I asked what tools help them in alleviating their symptoms and had conversations with them about the challenges they’ve experienced in accessing care.

With Carmel, we discussed how there should be more funding for administrative assistance for disabled folks. With brain injuries, people might have difficulties being on screens so there needs to be additional support that would help with that. In my conversation with Patricia, we chatted about insurance and how not having access to physio and other types of care work can exacerbate symptoms. These conversations informed the works I made for Carmel, Patricia, and Katie. I wanted these wearable art pieces to respond to their symptoms while visually conveying some of the topics that came up in our conversation. Katie, for example, spoke about how brain injuries are invisible, even within queer and disabled communities. People may not often believe you because you’re not showing physical symptoms of pain. I used neon colors in Katie’s pieces to account for that. It was also important to draw on their personal style because I find that a lot of disability tools are clunky and ugly. I wanted my pieces to be fun and something my interviewees would want to wear. I see it as a labour of care toward them because when I had intense symptoms, they really created a sense of community care for me.

Speaking to each other can be a huge help in navigating the system. Wage transparency is a great example of this. For people with chronic pain, discussing and sharing strategies about how you are making it work is important. Spaces like Tangled Arts and Mayworks Festival are doing a great job; they really consider disabled artists. I do think access is improving over time in the arts sector but I want to see more of it. In one of my recent curatorial projects with Mending the Museum, we put a clause in the artist contract that stated if the artist experienced any sort of health issue that prevented them from completing the work, we’d still honor paying them for their time. I’ve had students in the past who’ve paid for my sewing classes asking me for additional time and resources. We need to be aware that sometimes someone might not be able to show up in a timely way or deliver within a specific timeline. There is no such thing as an art emergency. There is no rush, even though the world tells us that there is. I would like to see more art spaces embrace that mentality.

it’s locked away

behind the pain of labour,

a hand reaching out;

still reaching,

keep reaching;

it grasps at the thread of my hope.

Camila Salcedo. taking care: brain injury stories (2024). Photo by Kafayé Clarke. Image courtesy of the artist.

What are the remedies for your labour pain? Are they obedient/disobedient (toward the system)?

C: I’ve tried navigating the terms of stability versus instability as an artist and explored to what degree I felt okay inhabiting those levels of comfort. At times, this meant having part-time jobs in order to sustain my practice but after spending two weeks in the hospital last year with severe health problems, this is no longer the case for now. Even though I don’t discard it as a possibility, I am unable to work an office job in the same way right now.

in the realm of precarity—

health, is it only for some

and not for others?

how do we decide?

How do you categorize the objects you exhibit in Labour Pains?

C: My objects can be described as helpers. The work is about caring for each other and wearable art is an expression of that but also a tool. My goal is to honor and take care of my community in response to how these folks have shown me care throughout the years.

hope that there is better,

hope that there is care;

what is care?

Camila Salcedo. taking care: brain injury stories (2024). Photo by Kafayé Clarke. Image courtesy of the artist.

Are there any radical ‘traditions’ for the healthcare system that you feel would be useful to a movement toward healthcare for all?

C: Community care happens naturally. At the opening of Labour Pains, Emma Steen, the curator, mentioned that without being prompted all the artists in the exhibition incorporated people they worked with in their artworks. It was evident that collaboration and coming together within the community was really important for this project.

Anytime I’ve experienced heavy health problems, I’ve been bolstered by an entire community of friends, family, and chosen family. Community Care should be translated more systemically within the healthcare system. We should have a team helping us out and not one singular doctor who refers us to a specialist. People have specialties but it would be better to have multiple people helping to come to a solution to your health problem. We should have a therapist, a nurse, and so on. They should be able to communicate better with each other too. I think that would really help. There should also be more accessible ways to access health insurance. We do have free healthcare in Canada but there are so many levels of care that are more holistic and natural that are not covered. Oftentimes, those are more useful. Family doctors usually prescribe you medication whereas other types of care work help you more somatically.

You can find more of Camila Salcedo’s artistic work, workshop offerings, and practice on their website and Instagram. For more information on Labour Pains and the wonderful artists involved in the project — visit the Mayworks Festival website here.

Talking EXTRA STRENGTH + PAIN RELIEF with K. MacNeil

K. MacNeil. Natura Morta. Image Courtesy of the artist.

Interview by Adi Berardini

K. MacNeil is a genderqueer artist, educator, and curator working in a range of media including printmaking, video, performance, and drawing. Referencing their own experience, their work addresses grief, chronic and mental illness, and the supports within the Western medical system. Their latest exhibition at home apothecary: OR EXTRA STRENGTH + PAIN RELIEF at Centre [3] in Hamilton features an interdisciplinary body of work that started as sketchbook ink paintings. As they describe, the series grew in its scope over six years, capturing the everyday objects used to manage self-care. The exhibition also addresses the resiliency needed while facing marketing schemes of care products in a capitalist society and the actions taken towards healing.

Currently residing in Toronto, ON, MacNeil has an MFA from the University at Buffalo and a BA in Studio Art from the College of Charleston. They serve on the executive board of SGCInternational and work as the College Printer at Massey College. MacNeil’s work has been exhibited internationally in Paris, France; Beijing, China; Canada, and throughout numerous institutions across the US including the International Print Center New York, the Western New York Book Arts Center, and CEPA Gallery. Additionally, they are the Hexagon Mid-Career Artist in Residence at Open Studio in Toronto. Read on to learn more about their work and the exhibition at home apothecary: OR EXTRA STRENGTH + PAIN RELIEF.

AB: Your exhibition at home apothecary: OR EXTRA STRENGTH + PAIN RELIEF addresses the wellness industry and how it treats health care as transactional and the resiliency it takes to navigate this. Can you speak more about your thinking and concept around the exhibition?

KM: The exhibition is thinking about transactional healthcare and how to be resilient in this sort of late-stage capitalist world that we find ourselves in. Developed over six years, I started this work as illustrations in my sketchbook and I didn’t think that they were going to go anywhere. At some point — after about two or three years — I just kind of kept making them. I [felt that] I need to commit if I’m going to just keep making this work and see it through to some type of conclusion.

I realized that what I was focusing on with these paintings, these sort of still lifes of objects that I was surrounded by, were an autobiographical body of work focused on what I’m using to try to take care of myself. A lot of my work has always been about mental health and stigmas and my own daily struggles with depression and anxiety. Naturally, these were all the objects that I used to treat my anxiety and my depression and various other ailments. So, it was everything from pill bottles to sunglasses and Q-tips. Sometimes it’s vitamins or band-aids and other little things like books.

K. MacNeil. Gender Dysphoria Hoodie in the Morning. Installation shot courtesy of the artist.

One of my favourites is a painting of a sweater that says ‘Awful’ on it, based on an actual sweater I own. The title is Gender Dysphoria Hoodie in the Morning. It refers to the gender dysphoria hoodie that [many] people in the trans community use to manage their dysphoria. When you’re dealing with this dysphoria, you just kind of put a big hoodie on and hide within that. That’s a way of taking care of yourself and a way of being resilient as a trans person.

I decided to take a broad lens and address everything that I use to take care of myself in all these different facets of my life. Through that, I was also examining the way these things are branded and marketed to us and the language used around them—and how interesting and problematic it can be. The way I like to think about this exhibition is a Venn diagram of what it means to self-care and self-medicate and treat yourself that’s the intersection of where all these works fall. It’s not exclusively critical of the medical industry but it’s also not exclusively favourable.

I was also examining the way these things are branded and marketed to us and the language used around them—and how interesting and problematic it can be.

It’s just trying to take a realistic look at like, for example, how I need ibuprofen and I hate how much I have to take ibuprofen, but it’s part of my life. I was recently diagnosed with chronic pain and they basically [told me] you just have to take ibuprofen all day, every day, which is what I do. And there are a couple of supplements that help, but that’s about it. It’s frustrating, but it’s also like that’s the best that the medical community has got in terms of treating that illness, which is pretty sad.  

K. MacNeil. I think my cough drops are gaslighting me. Installation shot courtesy of the artist.

Your piece ‘I think my cough drops are gaslighting me’ has printed HALLS wrappers and the messages seem to address how manufacturing health and wellness plays into toxic positivity, especially during the pandemic. Can you speak more about this piece and the interactive aspect of it as well?

The piece is a pile of replicated HALLS cough drop wrappers that were printed using a linocut block for the logo and then letterpress for the motivational pep talks that they use. The whole thing is hand-printed and handmade. I say that because a lot of people thought that they were real cough drop wrappers and a pile of garbage on the floor. It’s art—I swear.  

I made just under 1,300 of them and all the phrases that are on them are phrases that I got from HALLS cough drop wrappers themselves. They’re from something called “a pep talk in every drop,” a HALLS marketing campaign that they wrap their cough drops in. And they’ve been doing it for years. The piece is installed as a pile on the floor and viewers are encouraged to take one of the wrappers with them and slowly deplete the pile throughout the exhibition. It’s a reference to the work of Félix González-Torres, who used depleting piles of candy in reference to the AIDS crisis and inter-personal relationships. I won’t get too much into his work cause there’s a lot to be said there. But I was interested in how Félix González-Torres was responding to a pandemic of his time, as I am with this work.

The idea initially came to me near the start of the pandemic in April of 2020. I had a cough, I didn’t have COVID, but I was still taking cough drops. I was opening up and reading these motivational statements when I was going through genuinely the worst month of my life. Several people I know had recently died and I had to quickly move over the border. I lost one of my jobs and just like everybody else, I was in a state of financial disarray as the entire world was ending. And it was like, what are we doing here? And this cough drop wrapper is telling me, “March forward,” “Get back in there, champ,” “Get through it,” and “Go for it.”

K. MacNeil. I think my cough drops are gaslighting me. Installation shot courtesy of the artist.

It’s a slap in the face, right?

Yeah, it was. I just [thought], “Wow, these don’t hold up so well in the pandemic.” The one that really got under my skin was the one that said, “You’ve survived tougher.” It hearkens back to that phrase that a lot of people like to say, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

It’s this kind of problematic idea that you can just withstand trauma after trauma and you’re going to be stronger for it. And it’s not always the case, but specifically with COVID, a lot of people didn’t survive tougher—a lot of people died. A lot of people got long COVID, and a lot of people’s lives were dramatically and permanently affected by this. And I think this culture of getting through it and surviving tougher is more harmful than just admitting, “Hey, we’re all going through a hard time right now.” We could use a little bit of softness instead of toughness, you know? The piece is kind of commenting on how those phrases are pretty gaslighting.

It’s also thinking about the amount of waste that’s produced by the medical industry. That’s a big part of this exhibition too, is just thinking about how much crap we accumulate from cough drop wrappers or pill bottles or random packaging. And how these things that we genuinely need to get through and to survive also come with a fair share of packaging and environmental waste that’s ultimately contributing to climate change. It was a way of encouraging viewers to take one of the wrappers home with them, instead of just mindlessly throwing stuff away in the garbage. What if we kept and took care of these things and tried to find alternate uses for them? I’ve been doing a lot of research into the zero-waste movement and trying to find how that works within my lifestyle. This is sort of my way of exploring that idea.

K. MacNeil. WITNESS MY SHAME. Installation shot courtesy of the artist.

Something that draws me to your work is how it fosters dialogue around mental illness and the stigma surrounding this. Can you speak more about how you address mental illness and mental health, especially in your piece ‘WITNESS MY SHAME’ which addresses how mental illness is discussed in society?

I would say that WITNESS MY SHAME and I THINK MY COUGH DROPS ARE GASLIGHTING ME have a lot in common. I was recently thinking about how it’s interesting to see this thorough line in my work because I made WITNESS MY SHAME many years ago and I didn’t think I was still working in that vein. Now I can see how that idea really stuck with me. 

WITNESS MY SHAME was a series of shadow boxes that highlighted phrases in a bold, black font that have been said to me personally, by close friends and family. I think they are phrases that you hear more frequently in response to mental health issues or chronic health issues. So, those phrases are, “I’ll pray for you,” “Just smile,” “Suck it up” and “You don’t have to talk about that right now.” Those were phrases that just shut a conversation down. If you’re trying to talk to somebody about what’s going on with you, whether it’s physical or mental illness, and the person you’re talking to doesn’t know how to respond, [they] use one of those types of phrases. It just completely shuts a conversation off—It’s their way of getting out of talking about something that might make them feel uncomfortable.

I took those phrases and I screen-printed them in these shadow boxes in this black font. And then over the top of them in the Plexiglas, I scratched several other phrases that might elicit those responses. Some of those phrases are, “I feel like I don’t have control,” “I just feel kind of numb,” “It feels like a life and death kind of thing,” “and “I can’t experience any more joy.” Those phrases came from a series of interviews I did for a sound piece, so they are phrases from other people who are experiencing mental illness trying to share what it feels like to have their mental illness.

What happens when you look at the piece, because you can’t see the scratched phrase super well, you have to look incredibly closely and come up to the piece and inspect it because you see it’s a bit blurry—your vision is slightly blocked. It was kind of interesting because a lot of people just walked right past the boxes and didn’t take that closer look. Then somebody would take a close look and then somebody else would take a close look and you’d see them kind of pull a whole bunch of people and [realize that] there are these phrases that are scratched on top of it. I appreciated how that happened because that’s what the piece is about. Some people are just oblivious, and they say these phrases that sort of steamroll over a conversation when you’re trying to reach out for help and other people stop and listen and take that closer look.

It’s more of a response to how people handle mental health and chronic illness in general. I think it kind of points to the stigma that it’s difficult to talk to people when they’re talking about mental health and that it’s something that we really shouldn’t even be talking about. It comes from that mentality that you should just suck it up, put a smile on, move on, and not talk about these things because it makes other people uncomfortable.

K. MacNeil. at home apothecary: OR EXTRA STRENGTH + PAIN RELIEF Installation shot courtesy of the artist.

I was wondering if you have any artists or other things that inspire you that you’d like to discuss?

I’ve already mentioned Félix González-Torres, his work is hugely influential to me. I don’t think you’d necessarily see a direct correlation when you look at my work but he’s one of those artists I’m always thinking about when I make work. He’s like the Patron Saint of printmakers. I don’t think he’s technically a printmaker, but every contemporary printmaker who is concerned with the multiple [loves him].

For this exhibition, I was also looking at a lot of painters. I technically did my undergrad in oil painting. In particular, Wayne Thiebaud: I have always been amazed at his sense of colour. Getting to see his work in person, find[ing] a subtle stroke of neon orange or a lime green underneath the form. I’ve always been fascinated by how his paintings come together and the little pops of colour that peek out. And certainly, I would say his composition is impactful on me too. I’ve spent a long time just looking at his work.

Another artist that I looked at a lot is Giorgio Morandi, a painter from Italy. His work is so lovely. It’s funny, when I would show his work to students, they were like “I don’t get it. It’s boring.” And that’s kind of what I’m interested in, the way he explores the banality of household objects. I’d say the last one for this exhibition is Philip Guston. I’m in love with the work that he does. I mean, especially the stuff he did later in life with the self-portraits and the more expressive caricatures that he was doing. But specifically, I’ve always been a strong admirer of the confidence of his painting stroke. You can tell that he just goes in, and he paints a line and that’s it, he doesn’t fuss with it. That’s something I always try to keep in mind when I paint because I fuss with things, and I want to get to the point where I’m not fussy. I want to paint a line and that’s the line.

One other artist that I wanted to mention is Finnegan Shannon. They do this piece called, Do you want us here or not which are these blue benches that they install in art spaces that say things like, “This exhibition has asked me to stand for too long. Sit, if you agree,”“I’d rather be sitting. Sit, if you agree,” and “There aren’t enough places to sit around here. Sit, if you agree.” You engage with the work by sitting on it. It’s just this brilliant and much-needed conversation about the accessibility of art spaces and public spaces in general.

Especially as someone who lives with chronic pain, I’m constantly telling people, “I’m sitting, I’m not lazy. I just have to sit, it’s just what I do.” I love those pieces because one, I wish there were more chairs everywhere in the world, and two, I think we’re on the same wavelength in terms of what we’re talking about with ableist language and spaces.

Do you have any upcoming or current projects you’d like to mention?

I’m currently an artist-in-residence at Open Studio. That residency is winding down, but I’m still working on that body of work, which is a series of etchings exploring waiting rooms and healthcare institutions. I feel like it heavily relates to this exhibition as well. 

It’s a commentary on the inaccessibility of healthcare spaces. Waiting rooms are some of the most boring places on the planet and yet there’s so much pain and trauma and suffering that happens [in them]. I’m very interested in the banality of pain and suffering and trauma and what that banality means. You sit in a room with a blank wall and generic seating that’s terribly uncomfortable for hours at a time, waiting to be seen by a doctor, and sometimes they catch your issue and sometimes they don’t.

I have this series of drawings of waiting rooms that I’ve collected over the past several years. I’m turning them into etchings, which I’m going to string together into one long, never-ending waiting room.

You can find more of K. MacNeil’s work on their website knmacneil.com and their Instagram, @kit.macneil.

Muscle Memory: In Conversation with Michèle Pearson Clarke

Michèle Pearson Clarke, Still from Quantum Choir, 2022. Images courtesy of the artist.

Interview by Adi Berardini and Aysia Tse

Michèle Pearson Clarke is a Trinidad-born artist, writer, and educator working in photography, film, video, and installation. As Clarke describes, using performative gestures, her work “situates grief as a site of possibility for social engagement and political connection.” Currently based in Toronto, Clarke holds a Master’s in Social Work from the University of Toronto and received her MFA in Documentary Media from the Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson), where she is currently an Assistant Professor in the School of Photography and Image Arts. Additionally, Clarke was the inaugural 2020-2021 artist-in-residence at the University of Toronto’s Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies and has recently served a term as the Photo Laureate for the City of Toronto (2019-2022).

In the following interview, Clarke speaks more about her most recent exhibition Muscle Memory at the Art Gallery of Hamilton. The exhibition features the film Quantum Choir, a piece exploring queer female masculinity and vulnerability through the shared experience of four participants learning how to sing. Also featured in Muscle Memory, is the photo series The Animal Seems to be Moving, which explores growing up and grieving her sense of boyhood, going from being read as a young Black boy to being seen as a middle-aged Black man. Clarke uses personally significant emblems of masculinity to reflect on both grief and the more playful aspects of queerness. Read on to learn more about the thoughts and process behind Muscle Memory.

Michèle Pearson Clarke, Still from Quantum Choir, 2022. Images courtesy of the artist.

Adi Berardini: Can you speak more about how Quantum Choir addresses queer kinship through the vulnerability of learning how to sing?

I’m not sure that it addresses queer kinship, but rather, it harnesses it because I knew I didn’t want to do this by myself. It’s always easier to do something difficult if you’re holding somebody’s hand. I knew that I wanted to harness that sense of togetherness and queer kinship, and that sense that it takes a village to do this hard thing that I wanted to do. I found three other people (participants Naisargi N. Davé, Kerry Manders and Kimiko Tobimatsu) who also wanted to do this hard thing, and I think none of us could have done it by ourselves. Maybe I could have hired a coach to get over my shame. It’s possible I eventually would have gotten there and just done it as an individual personal thing. But as an artist, you get to create these experiences and these processes, you can bring a process into being that is just so much more rewarding.

 I think a lot of people can relate to the shame of feeling like you can’t sing, but also lots of people will happily get up at a bar, sing terribly at karaoke, and think nothing of it. I think the four of us deeply understand how difficult this was for each of us. Even though I think some people in our lives, our community, may not understand. We feel bonded because I mean, everybody almost dropped out before each singing lesson. And as I said, I cried. One participant almost wasn’t sure she would be able to come and see it in person because she just wasn’t sure she could bear seeing herself singing publicly, even though she had been through the process. So, it is extremely challenging for all of us to share our voices. This is the first time we’re all singing publicly.

And I understand what it means to not just do it but to make something that you can share with an audience. Laverne Cox introduced the term “possibility model,” how you have to see it to be able to be it. We offer each other a sense of permission and possibility through all our choices and actions. That’s something I try to do with my artwork. Not to say that everybody in the audience needs to go and learn how to sing, but if these four people could do this hard thing, what hard thing in your own life might you want to harness, tackle, or work through?

Michèle Pearson Clarke, Still from Quantum Choir, 2022. Images courtesy of the artist.

Aysia Tse: You use performative gestures and repetition in your work. I’m wondering how intentional those choices that you make are, and if you see them connecting to your discussion of visibility and invisibility?

I would say performance is one of the bedrock strategies for me in my practice because I’m very interested in the relationship between looking and seeing, and thinking and feeling, so affect is something I’m always thinking about. How do I produce an affect in the work that I make? I find performance and repetition are strategies that generate a lot of affect. I’m just completely compelled by what repetition does. We learn, we gain knowledge, and gain experience through repetition.

Half of Quantum Choir is just us doing our vocal, upbeat exercises on our vocal warmups. We say words in the singing, but we never speak. So instead of interviewing those three people to ask them about their experiences of being masculine and the vulnerability associated with that, it’s like we’re expressing it through this metaphorical way of communication. For the first time, I worked with a choreographer having people do the same movements. We spent the day with our movement coach and did a workshop where we talked about our relationship to masculinity, our relationship to our bodies, movement, gesture, and performance. And then, collectively, we listened to the song that we were learning to sing. And we all just decided on these simple gestures, we performed for the camera when I shot.

I knew that with Quantum Choir, I was filming everybody separately, but that [most] of the piece I would have two, three, or four voices together. And I knew that in the scenes where it’s only one person singing, that is the peak vulnerability, right? Because when there are two voices, your inability to sing is a little bit lost by somebody else’s inability to sing. But at that moment where it’s just [one person] singing, I was thinking, how do I communicate and express an enormous amount of solidarity and collectivity? When the three of us are moving and one person is singing, I wanted that choreography and that intentional movement to emphasize that we are in sync, we are together. We got you. We’re not just standing there listening to a person singing. Almost like a boy band, there’s something about movement together that expresses we are all one, we belong, we are a group.

Quantum Choir, 2022. Four-channel 4k video installation (colour, sound, 12:46), soccer balls, and training cones. Photo credit: Natalie Hunter.

AT: I love how you integrate sport into your practice. I see that there are soccer balls in the exhibition, and it seems like you’re thinking through the architecture of the space very thoroughly. Can you explain these creative choices?

It’s exciting for me because when you’re an emerging artist, you’re not always able to realize your ambitions. Institutions don’t give you enough space and resources. Muscle Memory is the first time I could design my dream installation. But one of the things I have been grappling with in the first stage of my career is the power dynamic of consuming moving image work in a gallery space. Most video in the gallery is projected on a wall. You walk in, you sit on a bench, and there’s this kind of passive consumption of the work. I’m always thinking about what it means to share the vulnerability, the griefs, the pains of queer folks, Black folks, of people of colour in a gallery space that, as we know, has colonial power dynamics still embedded in it.

And when I think about that history, particularly of making Black pain a spectacle for public consumption we go right back to the circulation of the lynching postcard. Even though I’m not showing that kind of violent pain, I am still showing pain. This piece is more of an extreme step in beginning to think about how I introduce more opacity and refusal into my work. With this piece, I wanted to think about how I ask the viewer to be an active participant in bearing witness to this vulnerability.

I’m always thinking about what it means to share the vulnerability, the griefs, the pains of queer folks, Black folks, of people of colour in a gallery space that, as we know, has colonial power dynamics still embedded in it.

The soccer balls have two functions. One, for all of us, sports is the only place in our life where masculinity has been supported throughout our life and for three of the four of us, that sport is soccer. Beyond that, the grid on the floor is a small ask from the viewer since you have to pay attention to where you’re walking. It’s a bit of labour and effort on the part of the viewer to come into the installation. Because of this design, even though we’re always on screen, you can never look at all four of us at the same time. This is what I mean about opacity and refusal—how do I hold something back for each of us? As a viewer, you have to make decisions from second to second about where you’re looking and who you’re looking at. It’s not just sitting on a bench and it’s all coming at you.

Glitter Stache, 2021, Archival pigment print on Hahnemühle Hemp, Alupanel mounted, 40” x 50”

AB: Can you speak more about your photo series, The Animal Seems to be Moving, and how you use humour to address aging and racial stereotypes surrounding Black masculinity?

MPC: This is an ongoing project that I started in 2018, I was 45 when I started it. I decided that I would work on it for five years and finish the project next year when I turn 50. This series is just really rooted in how I’ve always been read as younger than I am. For [most] of my life, I have been read as a young Black boy. Then before I started working on this series, I was brushing my teeth one day and I thought, “Oh, your face is finally beginning to catch up to you.” And then I just found there was a span of particularly hostile encounters with strangers. Obviously, I don’t know what’s in people’s minds, but I started to surmise that I am moving from being read as a young Black boy to being read as a middle-aged Black man.

Even though Black boys do have their innocence robbed and often get read as older than they are, a Black man is to many people more threatening than a Black boy. I was thinking “Now I have to worry about more risks and less safety for myself in the world as I age.” Then I was just struck by how absurd that is. Using humour and leaning into the absurdity of oppression is not a new strategy, right? It’s something that if you’re a woman, if you’re queer, if you’re trans, or come from any minority position, if you face oppression, then humour is in your tool belt for coping with oppression. It might be you read some nonsense in the paper, and you just laugh. If we responded to everything with anger and grief, we wouldn’t get out of bed. There’s grief, right? Every time I walk into a woman’s washroom and a woman shrinks in fear because she thinks I’m a man coming to hurt her, there’s grief. There’s grief that people see me that way, that people respond to me that way, that [my presence] in their world can create that kind of interaction.

It’s absurd also that people see Black men as a threat but that gets transferred to me because of my gender presentation. Oppression, at the root of it, is absurd and I wanted to incorporate that. How can I work these ideas of performance in a photograph? But it also helped me, [that] with both pieces there’s play and there’s humour. Both pieces are about [the] vulnerability and grief of being seen in ways that are not how you feel yourself to be in the world. In both pieces, rather than foregrounding victimhood or a trauma position, they foreground the pleasure that’s part of the experience too. Both are trying to acknowledge that oppression exists, and the pain is real, but it was fun to make Quantum Choir. It is fun to be gay.

The absurdity is both trying to point to the absurdity of the gaze and the assumptions about me, but it’s also a way for me to express the joy, pleasure, and the fun that I’m having aging. And how do I prioritize that for myself? How do I let [myself] define my experience of aging and not that external gaze? I have to live with it, I have to contend with it every time I leave the house, but how do I foreground my pleasure and experimentation and play? And a little bit of that series is also melancholy in terms of feeling like I’m saying goodbye to my boyhood as well.

They’re also intentionally photographs because when I’m out in the world, I don’t want people staring at me trying to figure out my gender or trying to figure out if they should be afraid of me or not. The photograph freezes that moment. In the exhibition design, I put seating in the room with the photographs because it is an invitation to look and stare as long as you want at these photographs.

I wanted to play with tropes and ideas of masculinity, and many of the ideas are rooted in my childhood memories because I wanted to be a boy when I was a kid. And I remember the things that my child’s mind associated with manhood, like in one of them I’m wearing one of those tree-shaped air fresheners. As a kid growing up in Trinidad, I remember it was something that taxi drivers had. I’m wearing it on like a gold chain, which is another kind of Black manhood.

Little Trees (Hold), 2021, Archival pigment print on Hahnemühle Hemp, 24” x 30”

AT: I think that you’ve expressed beautifully how grief is personal for you and your boyhood and kind of moving through different stages of life. Do you also see it as personal and collective in your work?

MPC: Absolutely. As I said before, there’s nothing I feel that only I feel. My work is also ethnographic versus autobiographical because I feel like the things that I feel are not because I’m Michèle—they’re because I’m Black, I’m masculine, I’m queer, and I’m an immigrant. There are these systemic, historical, and cultural factors that mean that people respond to me in certain ways, which make me feel a certain way. Anybody who occupies my identities, those same cultural, historical, and social factors are [imposed upon them]. The feelings I’m exploring are not individual feelings. They’re political feelings, they’re public feelings that are produced by political and social forces.

To me, grief itself is something that in Western culture we are told should be private, not public. By bringing it into the gallery space, I’m bringing it into a public space. I do think that grief is one of those things where everything is politicized. We see it in the world’s response to Ukraine, not that the world shouldn’t have responded to Ukraine the way it has, but the world didn’t respond to Yemen in the same way. The grief of certain people has more value to a degree than other people. We’re not free of systemic forces with anything, even when it comes to grief.

I also feel that one of the ways that Black people have been robbed of our humanity is the ideas that white supremacy brought into being to justify slavery and similar for Indigenous people. We are not seen to have rich interior lives—That’s not a coincidence. It’s white supremacy [proclaiming] “Let’s reduce these people so that we can justify the way that we treat them.” This lingers in contemporary culture.

When I lost my mom, I couldn’t find anything that [spoke to] the experience of a Black queer person losing their mother. I couldn’t find a book; I couldn’t find a tool. I couldn’t find anything. Everything about Black loss is homicide or violence. The only grief that our culture wants to talk about is hurt and anguish, not just the everyday thing like losing your mom. We don’t get to be seen as having [that kind of grief]. It hurts since it’s just the most mundane kind of everyday grief. That’s what I mean about grief as a site of social engagement and political connection. It’s a way to connect to the impacts of these larger forces.

For people who feel like they are different from me in the world and that we have nothing in common to sit and watch Parade of Champions, which is the work I made about grieving my mother—It sounds so ridiculous but I’ve met the little old ladies who don’t understand, nothing in their life has ever prepared them to think that somebody who looks like me could feel what they feel. We are the same in that way and grief is the most universal human experience. And so, by sharing queer grief, by sharing feminist grief, by sharing Black grief, it is a way, hopefully, for people to feel that kinship across differences.

Michèle Pearson Clarke’s Muscle Memory is on view at the Art Gallery of Hamilton until September 5, 2022. This interview will be featured in our second print issue on Queer and Feminist collaboration, launching later this summer.

Meditations on “Positive Energy” with Jen Rao

xiukouxiaoxing, illustration by Jen Rao.

By Jen Kwan

正能量 (zhēngnéngliàng) [positive energy] rose to fame as a catchphrase on Chinese social media in the early 2010s. Anything – a TV series or news article – had zhēngnéngliàng if it could spark optimism and hopefulness. This is easy to apply to the creations of Jen Rao. But there is little to be said for taking art at face value.

“A lot of my personal projects are expressions of identity—as a woman, a queer femme, a sexual person, someone with Chinese diasporic origins…Marginalization is a big motivation for trying to express a darkness beneath the outward appearance of color and positivity.”

Jen left Chengdu in southwest China’s Sichuan province at the age of five. She lived in a few North American cities—mostly in Canada—in suburban, predominantly white neighborhoods. She graduated with a business degree, in her parents’ best interests.

“I struggled to connect with both the children of the Chinese immigrant families we had banquet dinners with and the white children that went to my school, from whom I desperately sought approval. I distanced from the Chinese kids, feeling deeply different from them, rejecting the behaviors and identifications that I felt were traditionally Chinese.”

Over the years, Jen’s perception of China has changed from what was presented to her as a child during trips to “the motherland” (“a patchwork of historical sites and commerciality”) to what she saw after relocating to Beijing in 2015. One night, a Tinder date brought her to School Bar, where she watched all-women Chinese punk band Free Sex Shop. It began a journey of rediscovering cultural identity through the discovery of subcultures she long resonated with outside of China.

“I was surprised to see these empowered and expressive women perform before me, completely uninhibited and unafraid to express their vulnerabilities. My eyes were opened to a scene that I had no idea existed.”

such a cafe, illustration by Jen Rao.

By the time Jen had moved to China, the concept of zhēngnéngliàng was shaping the country’s societal and political messages. It ran parallel with the government’s plans for economic development. In 2014, it announced a campaign to decongest Beijing through urban rejuvenation. Three years later, the “Great Brickening” in 胡同 (hútòng) [traditional alleyway] areas unfolded.

“Buildings that were deemed not up to code or operating under the incorrect zoning were demolished. Windows and doors were bricked overnight. I began, almost obsessively, documenting the changes in the hutongs through watercolor illustrations.”

Under the moniker “drift & dune,” she depicted shopfronts of businesses at risk through a series of postcards, which these establishments would display and sell as souvenirs. Most of them no longer exist. In 2018, she exhibited for the first time in a group show called “Hutong Art Project Vol. 1 — Vitality Remains.”

“The event felt like a collective goodbye to the hutongs as we knew it, and although we were brought together by something that was less than desirable, it felt unifying.”

Ironically, zhēngnéngliàng originates from the Chinese translation of a self-help book by British psychologist Richard Wiseman titled Rip It Up. Ironically, it was through this pivotal event—also colloquially known as the 拆 (chāi) [tear down]—that Jen had inadvertently carved a path for herself in the local art scene. One day, at an affordable art market, she met the co-founder of a Beijing collective that documents underground culture through illustration.

thinking of you zine by Jen Rao.

“Shuilam Wong encouraged me to put my work out there, and so I created my first self-publication, a mini-zine that could fit in your pocket that explored the sentimentality of inanimate objects. I printed 40 copies and sold them at Shui’s table for 5 kuai ($1) a pop. Despite the tiny physical size of the creation, it felt like a milestone.”

In Chinese media, narratives that appear to get a zhēngnéngliàng stamp of approval feature the quality of overcoming a setback. In Jen’s case, that anecdote likely begins with the rescue of a partially blind pug named 包子 (bāozi) [steamed stuffed bun], who sometimes went by “nugget.” When she and her then-partner Dave Carey lost their teaching jobs and studio to the COVID-19 pandemic, they took a leap of faith and invested their life savings into a business venture. The stylized name and image of Baozi’s face became the symbol of a cassette label called nugget records, with a quaint space that houses a café, bar, recording studio, and music venue.

baozi, illustration by Jen Rao.

“We were not experts on any of what we were doing, but everything was done with a lot of heart.”

nugget upholds a purpose to be an inclusive and accessible convergence point for Beijing’s local and foreign communities, which has somehow propelled Jen into a coincidental role as an ambassador for the Chinese diaspora.

“We occupy both of these spaces and I think that’s kind of rare [in Beijing] for someone from the diaspora, so I don’t take that lightly. I want to utilize and implement the things I’ve gained from experiences of my North American upbringing in a household of Chinese values…It’s important to me to operate a radically accepting space, especially in China, where that’s not always the case.”

While co-running nugget, Jen has expanded her creative practice and collaborations in digital art and live visuals. It has brought exposure on local media platforms, including the Chinese-language editions of the Wall Street Journal and Kinfolk magazine. But she often also speaks of the challenges as someone whose identity intercepts peripheral minority categories.

“I experience micro-aggressions and discrimination regularly due to being a young female business owner…Even though my work has been published, I still suffer from imposter syndrome.”

Less than a year after nugget opened, Jen found herself coming to terms with keeping a friendship and business with someone who was no longer a long-term romantic partner. Although she questioned her queerness for years, the breakup prompted a search for answers.

 “I started a journey of introspection. I started reading about comp-het (compulsory heterosexuality). I started sharing with people. They really encouraged and supported me, and it did lead to my coming out…I know how much chosen family and community is important to me. And I want to be able to extend my own communities in a way that might touch upon my insecurities and experiences of marginalization. But I am also compassionate to the fact that other people will want this, too, and I want to bring it to them.”

séance salon graphic by Jen Rao.

For six months, Jen lived in a housing collective, fondly referred to as Studio 702—a nod to the New York night club of the late 1970s, Studio 54. The storied 300-square-meter apartment, infamously known for its parties, has been home to a range of Beijing creatives in the past decade. There, Jen introduced the séance salon, a project aimed at creating a space for women and non-binary people to share knowledge and art and discuss topics related to intersectional feminism in a non-commercial and uncensored setting. The small 20-member gathering is a relatively big feat in a country where there are unpredictable consequences to crossing or even towing the boundaries of censorship.

“We’ve covered menstruation, fertility, birth, abortion, sex, sexuality, and relationships…It was my first time having to be able to speak about these things in such an uncensored way. And just being able to create that for other people’s involvement as well as my own was really rewarding, liberating, and empowering.”

While nostalgia and idealizations of periods, places, and objects have been key to Jen’s art, expressions of vulnerability have become the core of her work. In the process, she is reclaiming a once-rejected heritage, presenting a counter-argument to a homogenous vision of China instead.

火花 illustration by Jen Rao.

“I want to continue to represent and communicate things that are important to me—to strengthen femininity, female sexuality, subjects and themes of the Asian diaspora, and a sense of being embedded in our generational and locational context.”

In China, many are attuned to seek zhēngnéngliàng, even if it means overlooking the direness of a situation. Separate from its political stigma, zhēngnéngliàng denotes proactive optimism that should not necessarily equate to toxic and relentless positivity. For about two months, Jen lived in Guangzhou, southern China, where she opened another nugget under a government-sanctioned program. Since then, efforts have also been made to keep the flagship in Beijing afloat. Operating amid a pandemic has been accented with financial woes and noise complaints about the space’s signature tiny stage concerts and gender bender parties. But Jen believes there is hope to be had from the community she has integrated with, helped cultivate, and given back to in ways beyond business and art.

“It’s hard to say these things with confidence, especially in a time that is plagued with uncertainties. Even though operating from Beijing is so difficult, we’ve been granted a lot of opportunities and have a lot of exciting things on the horizon. So, I’m generally very optimistic, and I know that our community will come through in the end.”

You can find more of Jen Rao’s work at drift-dune.com and on Instagram at @nekObean. Also check out nugget records on Bandcamp.

Talking to Myself: On the Occult

The Star Card display. Photo courtesy of Emme Lund.

By Emme Lund

In 2015, in the shed behind the Small Press Distribution warehouse in Berkeley, CA, I had a tarot reading with CA Conrad during Halloween weekend. The shed was warm. Christmas lights lined the crease where the walls met the ceiling. The poet’s painted fingernails bent over the edge of the deck, bracelets dangling from their wrists. “What would you like to ask the cards?” they said.

            “I’m stuck. How do I unstick?”

            I’d had a terrible week, month, whole year, actually. My partner and I were moving to Portland, OR in a couple of weeks. When I first moved to Oakland, I thought I would live there forever, eventually dying in the Bay Area, but capitalism ruins all and the tech industry had pushed rents far past what we could afford.

            CA Conrad shuffled the cards, their eyes closed.

            They laid out three cards on the table in front of me. One for the past, one for the present, and one for the future. I don’t remember the exact cards, but I remember the story they told.

            The first card was a jumbled mess, a forest burning to the ground. They tapped the card. “You’ve had a hard time. Your past was difficult.”

            There’s a feeling I get when something rings true for me, a feeling that I’ve chased for much of my life because, for a long time, most things did not ring true. Everything felt wrong, even things that felt right to others. This feeling comes up in my chest, catches in my throat, and a burning finds the backs of my eyes. I have always been quick to tears. I was reckoning with a lot then. My drinking was out of hand. Queerness was bubbling inside of me but right beside it was bubbles of shame. I had been thinking a lot about that feeling of wrongness I’d felt my whole life, the thing that made it so that many things did not ring true.

The Death Card display. Photo Courtesy of Emme Lund.

            They moved on to the next card. Someone walked among the burnt forest, assessing the damage, a card later in the same series. “Here you are now,” they said, “going over your past, understanding how hard it was for you.”

            This rang less true for me. I wasn’t dealing with my past. I was looking to the future, looking for a way to happiness.

I must have made a face, because CA Conrad smiled and then tapped the next card, a star exploding. “This is a very good card,” they said. “In this card, you are surrounded by people who love you. Life feels like a party. This is your future, but you won’t get there until you’ve reckoned with your difficult past and figured out who you are.”

I felt a kinship to these people and so I let them read tarot for me, I looked up my natal chart, and over and over again, I experienced that feeling of something ringing true, a feeling I had not felt in some time.

It took me a long time to find a home in reading tarot and following astrology. I was raised in a devoutly Evangelical Christian home, a household so strict that I was once forbidden from owning anything related to aliens after my grandfather walked in one day and claimed all things outer space to be the work of Satan. My aversion to the occult was based on the false dichotomy that if tarot and astrology were the work of the Devil, the opposite to Christianity, then it was also a religion, the opposite side of the same coin. I didn’t want anything to do with any religion. I’m a queer trans girl who asks questions about everything around her. All I ever heard was that I was either born wrong or choosing a path that led to my own destruction, all in the name of religion.

            I must admit that when I first left Christianity, I swung too hard into the world of logic and reason. I abandoned any search for magic out of fear that I would find myself trapped in another religion. But I quickly found that something deep inside of me wanted me to explore my depths. My gravitation towards the occult grew out of a desire to know myself.

            And some magic cannot be denied.

            In 2005, I met the person who later became my wife. I fell in love. Early on in our relationship, they said something to the tune of, “Magic is simply science we can’t explain yet.” We moved to the Bay Area together and quickly fell in with a crowd of witchy poets, the kind of friends who throw parties where someone is reading tarot in the corner and new acquaintances ask what your sun, moon, and rising sign is as soon as they learn your name.

I felt a kinship to these people and so I let them read tarot for me, I looked up my natal chart, and over and over again, I experienced that feeling of something ringing true, a feeling I had not felt in some time.

The High Priestess Card display. Photo courtesy of Emme Lund.

           

I don’t think astrology or tarot can predict the future.

I believe astrology lays out a blueprint for the kind of person we may become and the challenges we may face within ourselves, but I don’t believe it is absolute nor is it the totality of our person. We are also our genetics and our social status and where we were born and who raised us and so much more. We have been watching the stars for thousands of years and astrology is a collection of our observations.

For me, tarot offers an opportunity to inquire how I feel about something, a chance to convene with my intuition. In 2017, exactly two years after CA Conrad read tarot for me in the shed, I got sober. I don’t think the cards or the stars could predict I would get sober, but I think I knew, deep down, that sobriety was something I wanted and astrology and tarot gave me the power to tell my story in a way that led to sobriety. For humans, stories help us make sense of the world. Astrology and tarot are a way for our intuitions to apply form and structure to the chaos of this life on earth. They lead us to what we want.

If you do A and B, eventually you will find C.

What I like about astrology and tarot, about magic in general, is that it does not care if you believe in it. It is not like the religion of my youth, full of absolutes. A refrain I hear often when I listen to horoscopes or teachings on tarot is “Take what you will and leave the rest.”

Nearly every morning begins with me seated at my altar, lighting a candle, and drawing a card from my tarot deck. In the quietness of the room and the space between my dreams and the emerging day, I can find a stillness that lets me consider what I’m feeling. Some mornings the card I draw feels exciting. Sometimes it is harder for me to understand what a particular card could mean in the context of the day. Often a card will only make sense later when I look back at what I was doing at the time I drew it, when the details of what my intuition was working on become clear.

             When I look back on my life now, it seems inevitable. Like, of course, I would end up here, a sober trans woman who knows herself better than she ever thought possible. I often think about that time in the shed with CA Conrad, when they told me I would not find happiness until I came to terms with my difficult past and got to who I truly was. I don’t know. Maybe my life was inevitable, but really, I can’t help but look back at all those times I’ve shuffled a tarot deck or read about what the stars were doing, trying to apply both to the context of my life. There’s no doubt in my mind that astrology and tarot gave me the space to convene with myself, to speak with my own intuition, and to choose which way I wanted my life to go. But as with all things: Take what you will and leave the rest.

The Boy with a Bird in His Chest by Emme Lund.

Check out Emme Lund’s debut novel, THE BOY WITH A BIRD IN HIS CHEST, out from Atria Books on February 15, 2022.

Part One: Ash Barbu and Deirdre Logue in Conversation

Recess, Cultural Production, Checking Out

Deirdre Logue, Home Office, 2017, 03:33 minutes. Image courtesy of the artist and Vtape.

By Ash Barbu

Ash Barbu is a writer and curator based in Ottawa, Ontario. Deirdre Logue is a film, video, and installation artist and cultural worker based in both Toronto and Brighton, Ontario. They first met during the research phase of the group exhibition Empty History, presented at Vtape from November 20 – December 14, 2019. Curated by Barbu, Vtape’s 2019 Researcher-in-Residence, Empty History explored the ways in which artists use video to interrupt narratives of so-called ‘queer progress.’ Alongside contributions by Paul Wong (Vancouver, BC) and Lucas Michael (New York, NY), the exhibition featured Logue’s Home Office (2017). Shot on location during a residency at The Yukon School of Visual Arts in Dawson City, the work consists of a single-shot, 3:33 minute recording of the artist attempting to balance on top of a slide-out shelf from a wooden writing desk.

Home Office does not seek to repair the unjust and the uncertain by fashioning new utopias. Offering performances of solitary, inoperative gestures and activities, the works of Empty History construct impossible narratives without purpose or end, carried out at the limits of what is deemed recognizably ‘queer’ or ‘political’ content. In this refusal of resolution and finality, they occupy the difficult space in between meaning and dysfunction, acting out and stepping back, and seeking change and giving up. Within the frame of the screen, life itself is presented in a fixed state.

Barbu and Logue met on August 27, 2021, and again on November 19, 2021, to reconnect for the first time since the presentation of Empty History. In this two-part discussion article, the artist and curator consider personal changes that have taken shape over the past year and a half, including Barbu’s shifting creative practice and Logue’s decision to move away from the city. Together, they discuss feeling stuck, checking out, and moving on.

Ash Barbu: It’s nice to see you. I know that we planned on meeting earlier this summer. Life got in the way of that. I’m feeling somewhat rested, having just returned from Vancouver.

Deirdre Logue: I don’t know if you know where I am, but I left Toronto. I moved away to a hobby farm just north of Brighton, Ontario. It’s about an hour and a half from the city. My partner Allyson and I sold our house in Parkdale.

AB: I would love to hear about it.

DL: In some ways, what has transpired over the past year and a half will help us continue the conversations we started during your research residency at Vtape. We could continue to talk about doing nothing as a form of something. We could also talk about why no one is doing anything when we need to do more—more about other things other than this preoccupation with the self and the relative notions that surround the self, particularly in the context of an art career or a studio practice.

I love the idea of talking about recess, the kind we are introduced to as elementary students, as a moment of release from a regime known as education. Once we are outside of the classroom, what are those moments of freedom supposed to mean? Are they supposed to help us extend our servitude and fulfill the expectation that we [should] be productive? Or are they moments to teach us that we can be free? I don’t know. But I loved recess. You’re allowed time to experience something other than the system that you are stuck with, or, as is true for most people, perfectly content with in some kind of way. Your trapped-ness can feel good, right? So, during recess, you’re exercising a muscle within this system, asking: Can I move freely between absence and presence? Am I in or am I out?

At my new house, I have wild guinea fowl. There is always one that, when you set it free, just runs back into the cage. It huddles in the corner without any real desire to be free. And then there’s one that’s always fucked off, at risk of being killed. But it’s been in the cage too long. It has no skills for the wild. My desire is to protect them from being wild things because being wild things means they’re part of a system that I can’t control.

What you and I started talking about in 2019 has, in a way, led me to leave the city. It has led me to question the role that artists can play in providing respite for other artists, at a distance from some of the frameworks that both force us into production and expect us to do more with less. Two years ago, we started looking for a place where I could put up a tent and stop freaking out. Allyson and I found a house that had been on the market for a while. We realized that this would be a tectonic move. But being here has bought us a very sweet and extended recess from a routine that we were starting to feel trapped in—both of our commutes to work were becoming more like a demolition derby, with buildings coming down and condos going up all around us. Toronto is in a constant state of destruction. It was starting to affect me. Navigating those stresses within the context of climate change, I just couldn’t reconcile it anymore. I couldn’t live with so many people living in such deep denial.

Since we got the house last August, we’ve set up a bunch of systems. We heat our house with wood. We have water recovery systems. We have chickens and eggs and a giant garden that we eat from almost exclusively. And we renovated and reconstituted a woodshop that acts as the site for an experimental studio program called FAR (Feminist Art Residency). Imagine FAG (Feminist Art Gallery) shifting to feminist land art meets community of care. We’re not totally off the art grid. We’re hybridizing the idea of stepping off the treadmill and stepping onto a different kind of path.

AB: As you know, I have long fantasized about moving on and checking out, too. We share that. When we met at Vtape, I was just coming to terms with my fragmented work life and my decision to walk away from more grad school. We spoke about burnout and queer failure. Today, we’re speaking about choosing recess from the art world. Perhaps we can start to think about recess as a modality, as a means of open experimentation, without any determinate end or outcome—recess as unbecoming.

Deirdre Logue, Home Office, 2017, 03:33 minutes. Image courtesy of the artist and Vtape.

DL: At school, during recess, you’re also in a panic state—you’ve only got a short amount of time. It’s very Pavlovian. The bell rings and you all run outside. The bell rings again and you all run back in. We forget how much we have been trained to be trapped, trained to have difficulty making decisions about freedom.

I think it’s important for us to take time to find forms of recess, not abscess, and try to challenge ourselves as humans, as artists, to examine the systems within which we work and decide whether or not they work for us.

I’m not suggesting that we all need to drop out of the artworld. Nor am I suggesting that we spend any more time deconstructing notions of what art is or can be. What I do think about is our personal accountability to the idea of being a cultural producer and what it is that we allow or ignore in order to see our own cultural productions surface and survive while others are made invisible. I think it’s important for us to take time to find forms of recess, not abscess, and try to challenge ourselves as humans, as artists, to examine the systems within which we work and decide whether or not they work for us.

Oh, I see a fox. It’s actually not a good thing. Hang on one second, please.

AB: Is everyone okay?

DL: Yes. Well, not really. I mean, we had six chickens, now we have two. We had ten guineas, now we have four. We are definitely guests here.

AB: How do you strike a balance with the wildlife?

DL: I suppose you get a dog. Dogs and foxes have a common language. Our friends lent us their dog, and I watched what Clarence did. Now, I’ve been marking territory like he does. Observing and assessing is truly the hard part.

AB: In 2019, we spoke about grant writing in the culture industry as a means to an end. On the farm, life moves with a different rhythm. You are observing minor tragedies, making the decision not to intervene every single time.

DL: I’m distracted by the fox. Can I call you back?

AB: Yeah, why don’t you?

Deirdre calls back in 15 minutes. After reconnecting, she takes me on a virtual tour of her farm using her laptop camera.

DL: I want to invite you to come here and do a writing residency, or non-writing residency, or resting residency, or any number of experimental versions of a residency that would be perfectly suited for you right now in your life. As we develop this program, we’re using people’s experiences of residencies that they didn’t enjoy as a guide.

AB: It’s such a generous invitation.

DL: Look at your calendar. We want to encourage guests to use the farm as an open, unrestricted space. We just did the Witch Institute, an academic conference produced by Queen’s University in collaboration with the Agnes Etherington Art Centre. What is the opposite of an online conference? An outside conference, I suppose. So, we held an opening ceremony and introduced three projects made by people that are part of our ongoing life relationships.

Syrus Marcus Ware is making a garden of future Blackness. With our friend Tracy Tidgwell, we produced a 250-foot-wide meditation walk through the five points of a pentagram (love, connection, grief, accountability, healing, love, etc.). We also invited the FASTWÜRMS, who performed a live raku firing about death and wonder. As senior witches, they had the showstopper. A lot of the people that visited had been working in isolation for a year and a half. It was very moving to see everyone together, outside, reconnecting, as if emerging from a chrysalis or something.

Deirdre Logue, Home Office, 2017, 03:33 minutes. Image courtesy of the artist and Vtape.

AB: I wanted to speak with you about process, non-productivity, and worklessness—in short, how we might begin to reject conventional measures of art world success, choosing something other than desperation and burnout. I think we’ve done that in our own way.

DL: Everything needs a reconnect, and that’s what we did today. How are we doing? What are we doing? Where are we in the world? There are other questions that connect us as well—questions that were revealed to us when we first met during your residency. And to me, that’s a form of kinship. I do find your proposals compelling. I’m also compelled to speak again so that we might manifest something tangible that could be useful to you as a curator, useful to me as an artist, or useful to other curators and artists. Maybe more so than just me running around the house after a fox.

Read part two of the discussion here.

Beyond Binaries: In Conversation with Mahsa Merci


Mahsa Merci, Silent Stars, Mayten’s Projects. 2021. Image courtesy of Amir Sohrabpour / Mayten’s.

Interview by Adi Berardini

Mahsa Merci is interested in challenging society’s traditional concepts of beauty. Through her paintings, sculptures, and mixed media work she expands notions of the gender binary by depicting queer, trans and gender non-conforming individuals using viscous oil paint and building up layered textures. Born in Tehran, Iran, Merci holds a Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design from Tehran University of Art and a Master of Painting from Azad University. Currently based in Toronto, ON, she has recently completed her Master of Fine Arts at the University of Manitoba, Canada.

In her latest exhibition Silent Stars at Mayten’s Projects, Merci displays two years of work examining the restrictiveness of social norms that affect the LGBTQIA+ community. Merci explains how “painting is one of the best ways to challenge strict binaries.” Through bending the binaries between man and woman, and beauty and the grotesque, she invites the viewer in closer to her work to experience the textures and relate to her subjects.

Along with her queer portraiture, in Silent Stars Merci explores the terrain of sculpture, often referencing Islamic architecture and broader queer culture. For example, her sculpture Find Yourself Through Myself consists of a figure with light teal hair peering into a mirror of another among a shrine of sequins and pastel pink candles, evoking both oral sex and self-reflection. Also referencing Islamic architecture and miniature painting, Merci includes portraits as an homage to the Iranian LGBTQ+ community. Merci’s depiction of identity is not edited or airbrushed, but displays imperfections and flaws, challenging society’s restricting binaries and expectations.

You depict the queer community, particularly drag queens, gender non-conforming, and transgender people in your work. How did you first decide on depicting the queer community as your subject matter?

I always worked on gender identity, beauty, and sexuality as a subject in my country [for] more than 10 years. In 2017, I was watching a documentary about a transgender [individual] in Iran who had to leave for Turkey since they could not live in our country. That documentary was like a hammer on my mind. I could see beauty, grotesque, sadness, all of these things. I started to work on this subject in 2018 and one year later, I understood my sexuality when I was 28 years old. After that, I understood why I decided to work on this subject in my art career. My subconscious knew about it, but my conscious mind didn’t know about it at all. We don’t have any education or educational materials, living in a religious country. When the educational materials don’t exist, how can you understand your sexuality soon and in a good way? In 2018, I understood my sexuality, but it was so hard for me until now.

I can relate in a way. I felt like I was late coming into my sexuality as well. It took me until my early 20s to clue in that this is who I am, and this is who I’ve always been. But because of religion or compulsory heterosexuality, you lose that.

Exactly. It’s hard to know that you are part of this community when you don’t see anyone, or you don’t hear anything, it takes so much time to find it. It is not easy.

Mahsa Merci, Stay, Oil on Canvas. 30 x 40 cm. 2020.

Can you talk further about how you use painting to challenge binaries such as masculinity/femininity, beauty/ugliness, etc.? In what ways are interested in redefining societal beauty standards through painting?

I can say I am multidisciplinary [since] I’m working with so many materials—I’m working with painting, sculpture, animation, collage, so many things. But with painting I [can] find something so special. I never had an academic background with painting, I never had an apple on a table that I had to paint. When I’m painting, it’s like I print the portrait—I start to build up the materials and textures. I find painting as a material that I can show myself [through]. I’ve always really liked to share the spectrum of everything: softness and harshness, beauty and grotesque, femininity and masculinity and I find that painting can help me to do it. Every stroke with my brush that I do I feel myself in it.

I want to make an atmosphere that the audience wants to come closer to the portrait. Heterosexual [people] may not want to come closer to our community. I don’t want to have two categories, heterosexual and homosexual, I want to see more friendship together.

Your work uses a great amount of texture through the building up of paint. Can you explain more about your use of texture and its significance?

I work with oil colours which help me get the textures that I use. I like working with oil on small portraits that invite the audience in closer to see the portraits. When paintings are larger, physically the viewers need to go far to view it. I want to make an atmosphere that the audience wants to come closer to the portrait. Heterosexual [people] may not want to come closer to our community. I don’t want to have two categories, heterosexual and homosexual, I want to see more friendship together. I want them to come and see the portrait and see the details, the textures, the beauty, and the grotesque of the characters. Some parts come out of the canvas, like nose, lips, hairs, and jewellery—they are 3D works and not flat works. It’s kind of a metaphor for me to show that these are real people. I want to show the feeling that they are coming out of the canvas.

Mahsa Merci, Silent Stars, Mayten’s Projects. 2021. Image courtesy of Amir Sohrabpour / Mayten’s..

Can you explain your inspiration for your latest show, Silent Stars at Maytens?

The main inspiration is myself and the challenges and concerns that I am facing as a queer person. I always look at the other LGBTQIA+ people all over the world. I feel all of us have the same problems living in a patriarchal society, but the level is just a bit higher or lower. Sometimes when I see my friends and some portraits on social media or the website, they are an inspiration to me—their clothes and the queer culture. Then, I reach out to them and paint them. I am inspired by two books, Gender Trouble by Judith Butler and Women with Mustaches and Men without Beards written by Afsaneh Najmabadi, an Iranian writer.

Mahsa Merci, Silent Stars, Mayten’s Projects. 2021. Image courtesy of Amir Sohrabpour / Mayten’s.

Your work featured in Silent Stars also plays upon sculptural and Islamic architectural elements. Can you speak further about these elements in your work?

The inspiration is from the book I mentioned, Women with Mustaches and Men without Beards written by Afsaneh Najmabadi. She is an Iranian professor from Harvard working on gender, sexual identity, and beauty in ancient Iran. Through reading this book, I found that there was no heterosexuality or homosexuality in ancient Iran. It was surprising to me that two men or two women could have love or a relationship together without judging or explaining it to anyone. You can see in the paintings that the male and female clothing was the same. But when the Europeans came, they changed the culture little by little. They enforced the idea that men and women should be together. Now, if you are part of the LGBTQ+ community in Iran, you [may wish to] escape from the country or not say it too loudly since your life can be threatened by your family or your government. Although it is not us, it was brought to us.

The portraits inside the mirror frame are all Iranian LGBTQ+ [people]: one of them is queer, one is bisexual, and in the middle two portraits; one of them is lesbian, and one is non-binary. I wanted to [display] Iranian LGBTQ+ people as monumental. I get the shape of the mirrors from a very old and traditional Iranian art called miniature. Miniatures are very old paintings that Iranians and Persians painted of a building, spaces, or narratives with very, very small brushes. It is very special.

Do you have any upcoming projects that you would like to speak further about or things you’re working on?

I just moved from Winnipeg to Toronto. I still don’t have a studio, so I don’t have any big project or exhibition planned. Although, a project I’d really like to start is to make more sculptures. I found that sculpture can show very different things than painting can, so I’d like to continue that. I also want to take more photography from the background of drag shows. I have so many ideas from quarantine that I’d like to do.

You can view more of Mahsa Merci’s work on her website and social media. The Silent Stars exhibition is on display at Mayten’s Projects until January 15, 2022.

Respect Your Elders: In Conversation with Biju Belinky

Biju Belinky. Drawing based on a 1993 photograph by Del LaGrace Volcano. 2021. Photo courtesy of the artist.

Interview by Adi Berardini

Based in Brazil, Biju Belinky is a visual artist and illustrator who recreates historical queer photographs, reinterpreting them into colourful and vibrant illustrations. Belinky captures the tenderness of these relationships, depicting the queer romance throughout history that has always existed but is rendered invisible by society. Often sensual and emotive, her drawings bring fresh energy to the historical photographs of the LGBTQ+ community of yesteryear.

Biju Belinky studied at Central Saint Martins and the London College of Fashion. Before working as a visual artist, she worked as an arts and culture journalist for seven years, which aligned with her interest in queer archives and documentation. Belinky also finds inspiration in tarot and magic, her drawings inspired by the bright colours and pastel palettes of animated shows and vintage Japanese advertisements. In the following interview, they speak more about drawing inspiration from historical queer photographs, overcoming self-doubt, and their creative process.

Biju Belinky. Self Portrait. 2021. Photo courtesy of the artist.

I am drawn to how you recreate historical and contemporary queer photos and create new energy and vibrancy to them through colour and line work. Can you speak more about your practice and why you use these historical photos and references? Do you have an example of a favourite photograph (or era) that you’ve recreated?

To talk about how I started working with that kind of subject matter, I would have to go back to four years ago, when I went through a long period of time not making art at all because it fucked with my self-esteem a lot. I just had a lot of issues with thinking that everything I did was not good enough. But I could see that not doing art was also fucking with my brain, so I decided that I was going to challenge myself and force myself to finish things without thinking too much about it. And I knew I had to do it working with something I thought was beautiful constantly, so that I was sure that my brain couldn’t go “this isn’t interesting anymore.”

I initially drew from my personal collection of images of queer love and affection that I had saved on my computer from previous research I had been doing for a while, and I started creating artwork from there. From then on, I kind of noticed that this subject was just an endless source of inspiration, and the documentation on it varies so much, from tender to sexy and affectionate. [There are] so many different expressions of queerness and women-loving-women relationships and through that, I had found a way to express myself through my art in a way that didn’t make me suffer. 

It was a cool exercise to find these photos and the history behind them. You end up finding more about these photographers that worked throughout the centuries, these images that were lost through time. For a while, I was interested in more Victorian photographs and women seemingly in love in vintage photos from the 1920s and the 30s. It was quite interesting spending a long time thinking “Where does this photo come from?”, “What’s their relationship?”. And the stranger one to research: “Are these women together or are they sisters?”, because oddly sometimes you’d find a photo where you think that they’re definitely a couple, but you do research and find out that they’re actually sisters. 

I always try to research a lot and find sources, to make sure I’m representing people correctly, [which] allows me to develop my practice more. Once I became more comfortable with drawing regularly, I started adding colour and I started figuring out again what I wanted to experiment with and the [types] of images I wanted to see in my work. From then on, I started to add different vibes to the images. When I started doing bright, colourful monochromatic representations of the black-and-white photos, it was fun to look at the photographs and think of what colour this makes me think of in a completely subjective way. I couldn’t explain why [one] feels pink or [one] feels purple. I’m not going to say it’s the aura of the photo because it’s not. It’s just me looking at the photo and feeling it. Like this thing feels yellow and so on.

My work and the images I draw from are not all soft; I hate describing them as soft. But they do exist at the intersection between sensual and tender. I’ve had long arguments with people about this because some people are like “your images are sexual.” And they are, but they aren’t. I’m not making explicit erotica. Even the images that are more overtly sexual where [the subjects] are naked or half-naked, have tenderness and sensuality to them. They’re not geared towards creating the sort of “Oo you’ll feel hot and bothered by this” feeling. If you find them sexy that’s cool, but at the same time for me, there’s more of a tenderness to it and I try to communicate that with my pieces.

Biju Belinky. Drawing based on a chloe atkin’s photograph from Girls Night Out. 2020.

That’s interesting. I wonder since they are queer images too, how that influences how sexual they seem. 

Yeah, people hypersexualize my work a lot. I’ve had quite a few commenters, especially men, come up and be like, “Oo sexy, threesome,” just that kind of gratuitous bullshit. If you want to consume sexy content geared towards straight men, there’s plenty of it out there. This work, my work, is not for them.

I think seeing my work as purely sexual kind of stems from the same type of thought where people see queerness as something that’s purely linked to sex and that’s it. Of course, sex and romance are a part of it, but queerness is such a complex, whole identity. So, for people outside of the community to just try to narrow it down to “oh it’s about who you want to bone,” feels reductive.

If queer women see it as super sexy it’s cool because it’s self-representation. But when it’s straight men projecting, fetishizing, and commenting weird stuff then it always makes me really uncomfortable. There is this skewed way of thinking that if something is queer and it involves women, it’s perceived by men as inherently sexual and often performative “for them.” So yeah, I think there is a hyper-sexualization of my images because they represent queer women being affectionate in a variety of ways. At the same time, thankfully my art has seemed to reach mostly the people it’s meant for.

Biju Belinky. Drawing based on an image printed on postcards by Steven Meisel for the SAFE SEX IS HOT SEX 1991 initiative, organized by the Red Hot Organization. 2020.

I think it’s good to have that sense of softness and tenderness in your work. I was drawn to it since it highlights that queerness has always existed by going back to the archive.

I think a lot about queer elders and older LGBTQ+ people and how many of us got the chance to meet older LGBT people that were around us growing up. It’s such an important reference to have and I didn’t realize how important it was until I met someone over the age of 60 who was a married woman with a wife, and I was like “you have so much knowledge in life.” I think this absence of role models doesn’t happen only because of the silence around sexuality but also the fact that almost an entire generation of LGBTQ+ people died throughout the 80s. There were so many major losses during that time that it just became commonplace to not know older LGBTQ+ people.

One time, I was showing my cousins some of my drawings. Only the very tame, appropriate ones, mostly from Victorian times, and with their mothers’ permission. My one cousin is around thirteen, and the other one is around ten, and they asked to see the drawings since I had been working on them nearby. My 13-year-old cousin was like, “How come none of these people are old? How come so many of them are so young?” And I was like, “Well it’s hard to find photos of older LGBTQ+ people to draw. I’d really love to do that, but it’s hard to find people above a certain age that you can draw. And in this era, people were often made to get married after a certain age, even if they weren’t in love.” And she [said], “That’s sad, I hope that you can find many pictures of old people and that you [can] draw them soon again.” 

I was emotional about that because she was rooting for there to be older queers. I never expected that at all. I [thought] how do I explain to this young child the horrible, horrible things that might have happened? I was coming up with ways in my head to explain it in a way that was simple but also was true.

I think that growing up as queer people in the 90s, we didn’t see cheerful representations of queerness. We saw the struggle, you see the trauma, you saw people coming out, and then how their parents now hated them. But we hardly ever saw affection for the sake of affection, in all its forms. I mean, small acts between queer people are revolutionary in themselves. But at the same time, it’s nice to just see yourself represented in something soft and loving without feeling like it needs to be a statement all the time. 

It’s nice too because a lot of the narrative in mainstream media is about coming out or trauma. I don’t want to say there’s a shame, but there’s stigmatization to queerness. To see that queer joy, does bring you so much joy.

I just want to see happiness; I want to see queer happiness and show as many sides of it as I possibly can and as many different types of relationships and kinds of people as I can because I feel like there’s not enough of that out there. I mean other artists are doing this kind of stuff, but when you look at other media like movies or TV shows it’s still so rare for you to be able to watch a film where the characters are queer and in love and that’s that, a film where you don’t have to watch a straight relationship for two hours just hoping for the side plot to be kind of queer. Sometimes you want to watch something sweet and soft and it’s not about suffering or about shame. Violence might happen in the street, that’s a reality, I don’t know anyone who hasn’t been afraid at one point or another. But it’s exactly because of that reality that I feel like my illustrations exist in a space outside of that, where violence is not a concern and there’s just this mutual understanding between the viewer and me of what the illustrations are and what they’re representing.

As much as we know this, logically, our history has been erased so many times that sometimes it’s good to remember that queer people have always been around, they’ve always been affectionate.

There’s a lot of art that I want to make about queerness that is a lot more painful or might be more complex in the way it develops and builds. But to have a space where I’m just able to see, especially when you look at older photographs, that queer people have always been around, is amazing. As much as we know this, logically, our history has been erased so many times that sometimes it’s good to remember that queer people have always been around, they’ve always been affectionate. People kissed and hugged and had sex and everything else for centuries. Queerness is not a side note in history, an imaginary bond we project today between “best friends” from the 19th century; it exists, it is registered. Its evidence is scattered throughout history and lives on even after so many attempts to wipe them out. It’s nice to be able to bring all that memory back to the surface through my work and to consume that for myself through my research.

Biju Belinky. The Lovers, 2021. Photo courtesy of the Artist.

Who are some of your artistic influences and artists you look up to?

I love anything by chloe atkins, her photos are amazing, and she did the Girls Night Out photography book. That photobook has such sexy and fun photos of nightlife. You can see that the people in the photos are so into each other, and drawing-wise it’s such a cool series of photos with so many dynamic poses. 

I also love the archival work that Gerber/Hart does. They have an online database of queer everything, they have zines and photography and stuff. They’re such a good reference, whenever I’m stuck, I always scroll down their website and Instagram [to find] inspiration. 

I’m really drawn to colour, not only in my drawings but also in the tarot series. I love the aesthetic of 70s and 80s Japanese advertisements for toys. They’re so bright and in your face, while still combining pastel tones with everything else. That is such a huge inspiration for me. As for artists that inspire me, there’s Nanaco Yashiro (@nanaco846) who’s a Japanese artist, and there’s also Choo (@choodraws) – they do very dynamic comic book-y scenes. Choo can draw clutter like no other person can. 

A lot of artists I’m inspired by have a unique voice to [their work]. I feel like I can see what type of person they are since they have such a clear visual language. Having that language [as an artist] is a huge ambition of mine. There’s an amazing wood engraving artist who does images of lesbian couples, Gessica Ferreira (@gessicaferreira100). There’s also Katie Aki (@miss_luckycat), Peter McAteer (@pete.ey), Anna Dietzel (@anna.dietzel), Helena Obersteiner (@helenaobersteiner), Savanna Judd (@heartsl0b), Joanna Folivéli (@foliveli), and Ing Lee (@inglee).

Biju Belinky. Spooky Girlfriends. 2021. Photo courtesy of the artist.

Do you have any advice for emerging artists who are just discovering their style and sensibility as an artist?

I’m an emerging artist myself – but a huge thing for me was a conversation that I had with one of my best friends, Helena, when I was initially getting back into writing. She has built her whole practice on the idea of mistakes and how accepting mistakes [can be one] of the best things that can happen to you. It was so important to talk to her and accept that my work isn’t going to immediately look the way that I want it to look. And it’s in the path of trying to make it look the way that it does in your brain that you’ll find the best things about your work. There’s a big way to go between your brain and your hand. When the image in your head is not doable hand-wise, you should just try to do it anyway—You’re never going to know what you find unless you try. That reaffirmed the phrase, “better done than perfect,” for me. I tend to be a perfectionist, but I can’t let my frustration stop me from finishing things. 

Another piece of advice I have is don’t be afraid to take breaks. I think we live in a culture where people want to consume things at way faster pace than what we produce things in. It’s okay to rest and take time for art. There’s a huge benefit of recognizing and respecting your limits. Do you, but don’t die trying to do you. Take breaks when you need them since it takes a lot longer to recover from burnout than it does to just stop once in a while.

Do you have any other future projects that you’d like to share?

I am currently working on my store that [has recently opened]. I will be including my art and an entire series on tarot cards. I am working on a zine with 20 other female artists in Brazil and the UK. It’s about myths about vengeful and raging women from across the world. We’re looking into feminine anger and stories of mythical creatures that are [based off angry] women. We’ve been working on it for a year and it’s in its finishing stages now.

[My friends and I] just opened a tattoo studio called Arachne (Arachne.tt). named after a mythical woman. The three of us have different levels of tattooing, I’m still starting out and practicing on willing victims. It’s all original designs by primarily fine artists in the language of tattooing. If you’re in Brazil come and get tattooed by us!

You can view more of Biju’s work on her website or Instagram.