masquerade

Gender and performance masquerade

This work was inspired by the photographer Claude Cahun and finds its origin in the in queer scene. However this project is pushed from the performance border to transgender. Like work done by photographer Del Lagrace. The concept comes from a feeling of being out cast. Personage on the picture merges two personalities. A white face sad clown portrays one of the characters in this dedoublement of personality; the other actor is the part of my life as a transgender. By mixing those two personages this self portrait try to pass a feeling of loneliness in difference. The reference to the white clown come from the heavy ‘make up’ use during performance and similarity use when I cross dress as a drag king. But moreover this constant smile or emotion painted on their face that I associate to personal feeling in an everyday performance.
One of the most inspiring set of image by Claude Cahun were the one she produce during the Second World War: “Claude Cahun_Self-portrait, c. 1920”

And the series of self-portrait done by Del Lagrace where he explores androgyny rather than a sexual binary gender http://www.dellagracevolcano.com/selves.html#6. Judith butler Write: ‘There is no gender identity behind the expressions of gender; … identity is performatively constituted by the very “expressions” that are said to be its results.’ (Gender Trouble, p. 25). Performing the ‘self’ comes to be the hardest part of the subject as it allows the artist to touch the cracks in there personality. Which part is performance and which part is me? The truth is that we perform in everyday life. As the series I would like to explore the one where my character interact with others.

I appear almost absent a ghost, a trace a light in the picture. However I am clearly different and attract the attention but none seems to know I am there. This reinforces the feeling of sadness in isolation. This is a festive meal that I am not invited to, therefore draws a parallel into everyday life as a member of the queer community. When reading about the work of artist who play with gender through alter ego like Duchamp sibling ‘Rose c’est la vie’ I realize that their voice help the representation of Queers in society. In the other hand cannot stop myself see the commercial purpose of it. Same comment could be made on an organised kiss between Britney Spear, Madonna and Christina Aguilera at the MTV award in August 2006.

Somehow the visibility display by the media does not fit our gender queer life therefore a ‘Masquerade’ in itself and our visibility misinterpreted. Sexuality is made many shades of grey there are: Lesbian, bi-sexual, FTM, MFT and within those tendency other variation exist.
The white pain I wear in the picture is the one of a performer, a clown, an FTM, a gender queer person, a daughter, a son, a brother and a sister, a student… but first of all it is the layer of sadness I carry with me when somebody look at me, stair at me, aggress me, it is my loneliness and the smile which hide it.

To concluded I still have interest to work on this project through male stereotype and constructed images along the idea of the one taken during the dinner setting to make a more coherent series.