Project Abstract

The primary theme that my project will explore is that of non-heteronormative gender expressions. I am fascinated by the space that exists between masculine and feminine – how one comes to occupy this space and how it is received and understood by society at large. I want to use art to challenge the notion that this between-space is inaccessible and uninhabitable by exposing the constructions that give credence to the binary’s stability and innateness. Working from a post-structuralist (and post-modern) framework, my work will disturb the oft-unquestioned ideologies around gender and compel viewers to reassess their internalised understandings of how one must perform socially. In Judith Butler’s terms, it will critically examine the ‘performativity’ of gender, thereby providing a platform for the emergence of non-heteronormative subjectivities. Contextually, my artistic practice will draw predominantly from identity construction and the (invisible-ised) fluidity inherent to such. It will focus on transgender identities and alternative modes of self-conceptualisation. Furthermore, it will seek to uncover the means by which non-heteronormativity is socially conceptualised as deviant and unnatural.