(This interview orginally appeared at positivelite.com. It was a three part interview. The first part was published on Oct 12 2010, the second on Oct 19 and the third on Oct 26. For simplicity I have included all three parts in one post.)
NINA ARSENAULT LIVES: A NICHOLAS FLOOD INTERVIEW
Two critically acclaimed one woman shows in the last twelve months. A book of academic theory being published about her and her work. Various upcoming multimedia projects. Nicholas Flood talks drama, fame and creative journeys with Canada’s notorious transsexual performance artist.
“Excuse me, are you Nina?” asks one of two young high school girls approaching us inside the desert arboretum in Allen Gardens. They’re probably fourteen.
Nina nods, not turning her attention from a brilliant pink flower blooming atop a tall phallic cactus.
“The Nina?”
She nods again. Robotically. A living mannequin behind massive Yves Saint Laurent sunglasses.
I invent a new eye roll. I hate being interrupted with her.
“Oh my God, you’re famous!” squeals one of the girls and throws her arms around Nina.
Behind her shields Nina gives nothing of herself to the girl.
But I can almost read Nina’s mind. I’ve been her closest confidante since 2007.
Back then the actress-doll-bot would’ve smiled and hugged back exactly like she was supposed to. She would have “let the love in.” Carried on. Snappy one liners. Kiki.
Today, after a few years of surviving being a national and local gay-lebrity she is skittish when surprised into this random improvised encounter. Wrapped in the arms of a tween embrace she’s icy and squeamish.
That is the paradox of Ms. A. Inside a whirlwind of art, publicity and performances that has become increasingly personal about her body, her sexuality and her history she is surprisingly shy. At times, reclusive.
Has it all been too much for her to handle? Or is it just part of her most impressive diva transformation yet –into a serious Canadian artist on the verge of some impressive international recognition.
Nicholas Flood: For as long as I’ve known you I’ve heard people accuse you of doing what you do to be famous.
Nina Arsenault: Yes, I did want fame. I own that. I wanted to be one of the legendary queens of my time, I suppose, like in Paris is Burning. Instead of voguing though I’d use my best assets –being smart, being creative, my storytelling. I absolutely enjoyed the attention at first, but that feeling wanes.
NF: Now you feel trapped by it?
NA: I don’t know.
NF: Would you give it up?
NA: No, I’m very happy with the way things have turned out. Being a high profile person has meant the opportunity to have my work noticed and produced. That has led to me rediscovering that continuing my creativity is about keeping a spiritual channel open, about living in the most vibrant possible way. I remind myself that it’s always about the work. The work is what is important now. The artistic investigation has taken on a life of its own.
NF: Your autobiographical play The Silicone Diaries is coming back to Buddies [in Bad Times Theatre] in November, right?
NA: Yes. It’s very exciting.
NF: Did you expect your play would be brought back for a second year?
NA: I didn’t really think about it. I was taking things one step at a time.
NF: What do you mean?
NA: I just tried to realize the play as well as I could. To reveal as deeply as I could. To be funny. To be compelling. I was so scared to do it when I looked at it as a whole project, but I couldn’t say no when I was offered the opportunity. It had always been a dream for me to have a main stage show at Buddies in Bad Times. So I made a schedule, with each daily task needed to complete the project, and I did it.
NF: Right, then it was manageable to get through, and it turned out to be a major success. The creative process is a journey of daily work, but if you look to what you have to accomplish in the end it’ll be daunting.
NA: Yes, but I learned that’s just an illusion that psyches you out. I try to concentrate on whatever task is put in front of me. It’s kind of like… Before I was an artist I was a web cam girl and an escort, and I felt very alone and isolated. I wanted smart, creative friends. I wanted to be friends with artists, and I also needed to express myself. I got offered to be in a reality show [Showcase’s Kink], and I decided to make it a project to reveal myself on-camera simply with dignity and with as much depth as possible. I didn’t think it was art but in my own mind I made it my own secret art project. I did a good job, I think, and lots of people liked me. Then, Mitchel [Raphael] offered me a job writing autobiographical columns for Fab magazine. I worked very hard at them to make them the best they could be. Then, I got to do photo shoots, host parties, Sky Gilbert wrote a play and offered me a lead role, then I got the chance to make my own plays. So I always took the next opportunity, and I worked very hard at that. Found a way to make it as good as possible even if I was terrified. Every time I do something well I get offered to do another cool project. I just keep following that. I don’t know where it’s going. It’s not that strategic. It’s a path that I can’t even see where it’s going, but now I have a body of work that contains documentary, 
autobiography, self-portraiture, storytelling and performance. All of those artistic forms seem to go well together and start to comment on each other. It’s very interesting to me. Also, certain themes reoccur and are explored in new ways. I’m very fulfilled by how the work is manifesting. The patterns that emerge interest me. It fulfills me more than anything I’ve ever had in my life. But, before I started being creative I felt isolated and at times deathly unhappy. So, I always try to tell people who say they want to be artists or whatever, but they don’t know how or they are afraid –I always want to say, “Take one step and make it as good as possible.” You never know where it is going to take you next.
NF: A path will unfold.
NA: Yes. Now, in following my path I find certain things are asked of me. The work needs to be of a certain quality because of the context, because of who’s producing it, because of what I demand of myself. The next step is usually asking me to go deeper into whatever psychological territory I’ve exploring. So I am asked to take new risks as an artist, and as a person. Or I could stop and get off the ride. But that’s not really an option to me because I’m compelled to stay inside the creative flow now. My art practice and my spiritual practice are one and the same. I get ideas or images that I want to express. I feel if I don’t express that thing, whatever it is, then I don’t get to move onto the next thing I will be asked to explore. The only way out is through. It’s a creative journey I can choose to take or not. So, if I don’t know how to let go of an idea I move forward expressing it trusting that I will be glad I did it later.
NF: At each step of your journey you have created an aesthetic object –a play, a photo shoot, an article, a TV show.
NA: I think that’s how to stay inside the creative flow.
NF: But you wouldn’t say it’s always easy.
NA: No. And yes. It’s a paradox. It’s the hardest thing to do, and the easiest.
NF: What’s an example of something that you wanted to do artistically but were uneasy about?
NA: Well, I don’t think I should say. Going on the cover of a magazine without hair or make-up was scary.
NF: You were deconstructing the glamourous image you’d created. It was one of your most brilliant and important moments in my opinion. Of course, you felt vulnerable and naked at the time.
NA: Absolutely. So I don’t like to have drama in my personal life. Especially when I am working on a show. Whatever I am doing I want my artwork to be as emotionally dangerous as is possible for me. That is the feat for me as the creator. I now like my personal life to be as simple as possible.
NF: Is that why you stopped hosting circuit parties? Too much negativity?
NA: I got inspired by other things. I followed my new passions.
NF: You’re on a higher spiritual level than nightclubs now.
NA: I don’t think of it that way. I think that is where I wanted to be then, and it was really vibrant. That was one of the best times of my life. Now I’m doing new things.
NF: What excited you about the club scene when you were in it?
NA: It had its own codes of behaviour, its own codified language, its own rituals, its unique performances. Glamour, too.
NF: A lot of people who leave the club scene complain about how shady it is.
NA: (sigh, eye roll) As you know people on drugs can commit extreme acts of sadism quite casually because they are disconnected from their empathy. I also witnessed ecstatic moments of religious-like frenzy at those parties. I think you have to be resilient when everyone around you is trying to live up to their utmost fierceness night after night. There isn’t a lot of room to be vulnerable, but that is not what that scene was or is about. (long pause, continuing with more vigour) When I was hostessing parties, it was simultaneously the rise of facebook and the first time digital cameras were readily affordable. Everyone was taking pictures, dressing up, enjoying personas, really living a kind of celebrity drag. We were being glib, being ironic, and having a blast. The people who criticize that scene weren’t apart of that energy. It’s so easy to look at a subculture that you’re outside of and be judgmental, to critique it for being silly and superficial. You had to be there to know what it was about. You have to understand irony.
NF: But you always posed like a mannequin when you had your photo taken. Wasn’t that your comment on a vacuous image obsessed subculture?
NA: It was entirely for my own pleasure. (pause, smiling) The Surrealists loved mannequins. They used them to make suggestions about the commodification of culture and to blur the line between the living and the non-living.
NF: Nina, did you actually expect drugged out twinks and circuit boys to get those artistic references? Those nuances?
NA: Who knows who will be plugged into what you’re saying, what you’re expressing, until you do it? Smart people go to parties, too.
NF: And you worked it until you couldn’t work it anymore.
NA: (exasperated) I am sure I will keep working and living with the image of the mannequin. Warhol did silk screening and used repetitious images for decades. Jackson Pollack explored automatist painting and pure form over and over. I think that is why it’s called an art “practice.” Yeah, whether its high art or low art or just creative expression you’ll always return to what is pleasurable to you, what is obsessive to you. I can’t stop that.
NF: Right, similar themes came up in your artwork and on your facebook.
NA: Why is that surprising?
* * * * *
Inside the geometric panels of glass and girders of the greenhouse we’re perched next to a man-made pond. Carefully placed Japanese rocks. Exotic plants. Mixed goldfish. An iron statue of a Greek goddess and a swan. I’m over-caffeinated. Nina is picking away at a container of fresh fruit and switches between sipping on a protein shake and vegetable juice. She swallows a handful of anti-aging vitamins.
NF: What about Silicone Diaries the novel?
NA: I did it as a play. You might think that a play is less demanding to complete than a novel, but I would say you are wrong. I’ve spent years writing, developing, rewriting The Silicone Diaries. I’ve done professional training to prepare for it. I’ve taken emotional risks I didn’t know I was capable of. I’ve taken the play on the road by myself. The process has been rigorous. It is a work of art, and I don’t feel the need to re-do those stories as a novel now. I still talk now and then to a publisher or literary agent about a memoir. The deal has never gone through though. But now when we talk about me doing a book we’re talking about a memoir about other times in my life. I think the club scene stuff would be great as a memoir.
NF: Really?
NA: I think it’s really important to differentiate between autobiography and memoir. For me an autobiography is an over-arching narrative of one’s whole life. Memoir is real life material, but only a section of one’s life, or a single story, or a collection of stories. Part of one’s life
NF: Your works are memoirs.
NA: Yeah, in memoir you get windows into the artist’s life, but not everything is explained. There is still mystery, and I think that is important.
NF: And then there is the book that is being published about you.
NA: Yep, it’s called TRANS(per)FORMING Nina Arsenault. It’s a real honour. The Silicone Diaries script will be published in there. I’ve seen pretty much all the photographic images they are using in there. I don’t know what the content of the writing will be yet though cause it’s other people writing it.
NF: What are your other upcoming projects?
NA: I’m developing a long form video called Ophelia/Machine. It focuses on a sadomasochistic relationship and sexual objectification. I want to write, direct, star in it, frame it, edit it, do everything. Use assemblage pieces from all my past self-media though, too. I don’t see it playing at Cineplex Odeon. I see it playing in avant-garde venues.
NF: The next step for you is video?
NA: Yes. Keeping in performance, but the next challenge is to turn the one woman show into a solo video piece. A one woman movie. Also, video seems the right form for this piece. In the theatre there is the consideration to be entertaining or compelling. You’ve asked people for their money, and it’s very difficult for them to leave during a show. People don’t do it usually. But with video they can just walk away or turn it off. That allows a video artist greater liberties I think. As the artist you are freed from these considerations to move into more unnerving territories. This is important for Ophelia/Machine because I want the narrative to be really fractured. Video is also more fractured than live theatre which seems right for this particular story. It lends itself to the expression of trauma. I also want some of my work to have permanence in a way live theatre doesn’t give me. I want to be able to look at my work in five or ten years from now. To see how I did. To look back upon my own fierceness. Also, total control over the visual image? It’s very seductive.
NF: Video is voyeuristic in a different way than theatre. The camera fetishizes in a different way.
NA: Yeah, my work is voyeuristic and exhibitionistic. It’s about seeing and being seen.
NF: There was a short time you were also coming to gay bath houses with me. Were you hoping that would be your new scene post-nightclubbing?
NA: Um… like nightclubs, I was also fascinated by their otherworldliness. They seemed like little pocket dimensions with no time. You lose all track of whether it is morning or day or night in there. Black light limbos where the regular rules of society are suspended. It was a maze. It was a hall of mirrors.
NF: You were coming with me to the most crunked drug fuelled corners of those dimensions, and I was in the midst of my addictions.
NA: I’ve never gotten heavily into drugs myself–
NF: –and I’m sober now.
NA: Yes, but when you weren’t I understood that every human being moves through periods of shade as well as light, good times and bad, self-destructive behaviour and as well as creativity. I’m not promoting drug use but I accept that we all have things to go through in this life. I hate this societal trend we have where everyone has to pretend they never experience conflict in their lives, that everything is always perfectly okay. It’s ridiculous. Sometimes we learn the most about ourselves by looking at our shadow. I accepted you and loved you at all points in your journey.
NF: And, you were fascinated by the darker sides of the human psyche you saw at the baths.
NA: I would say I’m fascinated by the dance between light and dark. The conflicts. That is the basis of drama.
NF: I wanted to take you there for a long time. It was funny to see how your presence challenged gay male identity. Half of them were living for the fact that you were there. The other half of them were incensed. It was transgressive. You really flipped the script on those motherfuckers. In my drug days I wanted to turn that place into German-cabaret-meth-frenzy-carnival-of-freaks-sex-and-fun-house.
NA: But in a good way.
(We laugh.)
NF: Yes and no.
(More laughter.)
NF: I could have almost accomplished it. But I got sober.
NA: Now, I have images of carnality burned into my mind that I will never forget. Male sexuality that was more animalistic, more primal, more intense than anything I’ve ever seen.
NF: (laughing) You’re going to make something of that experience, aren’t you?
NA: Maybe.
NF: What are you going to call it?
NA: I Live. I want to perform it on this karaoke device called iLive which is made by the same people who make the iPod. It’s bubble shaped and puts quite a technological sound onto the human voice. I think there’s even a vocoder option.
NF: I love it. What do you tell people when they ask you why you want to do these performances?
NA: I want to give voice to how I see reality and experience. Not the way someone else sees it, not the way TV portrays it. I like the idea of doing feats, and then coming back to a quiet emotional place to make art about it. (pause) I was watching this documentary about Andy Warhol and this art theorist came on. I can’t remember his name, but he was talking about Andy’s self-portraits. I mean, in a way I think we are coming out of a time now with facebook and the age of blogging when self-portraiture and self-dissemination are ubiquitous forms of expression, the popular forms of self-expression of our times. So, I thought it was interesting that in this documentary about Warhol this theorist said that he thought whenever a person does self-portraits it is coming from a primal impulse to fight non-existence. About somehow putting a mark on the wall to say, “I had this life. This was me. I existed.”
After an entirely sold out run and critical raves Nina’s tour de force account of her physical transformation The Silicone Diaries is being brought back to Buddies in Bad Times Theatre (Nov 25th – Dec 11th). Catch it before she leaves on a national tour.
iLive will be workshopped at Nakai Theatre’s Pivot Festival in Whitehorse, Yukon. It will be showcased with her other performance piece Like a Barbie, creating a two day performance event called Like a Barbie, i Live.