 |
 FIGHTING COCKS 2011
Fighting
Cocks is the
investigation and reenactment of the dynamics of violence, play and masculinity
in a site that typically offers no space for other than a normative expression
of gender and an over accentuation of behaviors that are a result of that.
Two bodies,
both performing queer masculinities, meet in a locker room and play out the
ritual of snapping towels. When a towel is snapped there is pain inflicted and
a mark left on another’s flesh whom, on their behalf, has to prove that they
can take it. It is a double play of dominance and endurance.
Continuing
this beyond a realistic degree this conventional confirmation of masculinity
and means of bullying is gradually deconstructed and new meanings are
constructed based on the queering of the locker room as a symbolic site. The
performance is a humanizing mimicry of a cockfight where the birds are
conditioned for strength, stamina and trauma.
For "Committment Issues" all the artists were asked to provide their definition of "committment" in relationship to their performance. Here are my thoughts:
1.
Full engagement mentally and physically in a praxis of
investigation that is felt to be personally and socially
urgent.
2.
The introduction of the potential for a “sincere”
experience for both the artist and viewer.
3.
The insertion of queer questioning regarding power,
privilege, categorization and normalization.
a: Example:
No exact results found for “queer
masculinity”.
Did you mean:
“questionable, tomboy, kinky, feminine, unsettled, sissy, emasculated, counterfeit,androgynous, weirdo, effeminate, aberrant, boyish, unmanly, abnormal, gay,weakened, trans, abnormal, butch, fabricated, freaky, womanly,
fake, impotent,suspicious, irregular?”
|
