Istvan’s a great artist, and a welcome collaborator. It is an honour to be signified by him in such a visceral and uncompromising way. He told me that he wanted to “paint the demons inside [me].” His works simultaneously exalts and degrade me.
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- The Crime of Embellishment 1
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- The Crime of Embellishment 2
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- The Crime of Embellishment 2 (detail)
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- The Crime of Embellishment 3
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- The Crime of Embellishment 4
They are beautiful acts. I have always had a deep relationship to my image and representations of me –a relationship that is erotic, spiritual, decadent, sadomasochistic and often feels insatiably bigger than me.
These painting are all mixed media (markers, pencils, ink, acrylic, construction wood), and they are quite large.
For purchase contact Istvan Kantor Monty Cantsin? Amen! use this email:
amen@interlog.com
Money from the sale of the painting will fund the video THE CRIME OF EMBELLISHMENT.
Fashion Forward: Fashion as art
by Isobel Slone
(this article from: Imprint, The University of Waterloo’s Official Student Newspaper, Nov25, 2011)
Queer performance artist Nina Arsenault articulated the beautiful confluence of fashion and art through her performance at the Modern Languages theatre on Monday, Nov. 21. She emerged from the audience clad in a vibrant multicoloured gown of ruffles and flounces reaching all the way to the floor. When she reached centre stage and turned around to face the audience, the dress was mini in the front and the bodice was covered in glittery pink rhinestones. Her perfect blonde presence was a spectacle to behold.
Arsenault began the show with a monologue called “I was Barbie” about her stint portraying Barbie at a Toronto Fashion Week event celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Barbie doll. “Of course, only a man could be Barbie!” quipped [the person who hired] Arsenault, who is a trans woman. The audience was treated to a grotesque yet honest slideshow documenting her own bodily transformation, that of a biological male striving to attain the ideal feminine beauty exemplified by Pamela Anderson. Arsenault describes it as “the kind of beauty that is never found in nature,” but is still valued as the pinnacle of feminine beauty.
Arsenault has spent much of her career using fashion and art to transform herself into different characters, from doll to witch to fairy. In one portrait, she appears as a fairy in a construction zone, representing her constant construction of self as well as twisting the image of “fairy” as a common nickname for gay men [and transgendered women.]
Like every good performer, Arsenault went for a costume change during the “intermission,” when she showed a short meta-reality film called Plane of Immanence, featuring Arsenault sans wig, clad only in a sheet from the waist down. She returned wearing a form-fitting transparent rubber dress used for performances of her one-woman show The Silicone Diaries. The dress revealed everything aside from her bra and panties and was paired with demure white stockings and black heels.
Arsenault’s body is liberated by her sense of dressing rather than degraded. Ultimately, her outrageously campy yet sexual outfits work to enhance her brand of trans woman hyperfemininity. If her body took 60 surgeries to complete, she might as well show it off.
This is my favourite blog out there right now. (I have this closet interest in science and quantum physics.) Rob Bryanton, the author who runs the blog, is brilliant. Really mind expanding stuff that puts things into a (cosmic) perspective.
He’s also written a book called “Imagining the Tenth Dimension.”
AUTHOR AND RESEARCH SCIENTIST DAVID JAY BROWN SAYS: “ONE OF THE MOST BRILLIANTLY-CONCEIVED AND MIND-STRETCHING BOOKS THAT I’VE EVER ENCOUNTERED”. –SCIENCE FICTION AUTHOR GREG BEAR SAYS: “A FASCINATING EXCURSION INTO THE MULTIVERSE – CLEAR, ELEGANT, PERSONAL AND PROVOCATIVE”
www.tenthdimension.com
(this article from Imprint, the University of Waterloo’s Official Student Newspaper, Nov 18, 2011, written by Paul McGeown, Assistant Arts Editor)
Arsenault set to turn on minds at Waterloo
Prominent transgender performer speaks with hope of opening new channels of discourse
Nina Arsenault has been performing for most of her life. Her body of work includes two plays (written and performed by her), TV appearances on Kink and Train 48, and dozens of photo shoots. Still, the 37-year-old performer gets nervous on occasion. “Sometimes I get nervous when I show the nude photos… but I’m also just so proud of them as artistic pieces.”
Arsenault, one of the most prominent transgender performers, will speak at the Modern Languages theatre on Monday, Nov. 16. The talk will sample some of her past work (she plans to perform one monologue from each of her plays, I Was a Barbie and The Silicone Diaries) and will also include photos and videos that she took during her transformation.
She sounded most excited, though, about debuting a new video that she called, “My $20 million sci-fi film.” The footage was shot inside Maple Leaf Gardens, which is in the midst of a sizable makeover. Of course, the actual budget was less than $20 million — far less.
“Really, we just broke in at night and shot the stuff until security kicked us out,” said Arsenault.
She calls the performance “part artist talk, part performance lecture, part comedy.” It sounds ambitious, but Arsenault has enough experience to make it happen. She has two postgraduate degrees in theatre, and has contributed to both the National Post and Fab magazine. She also has no shortage of content: “My life has been so sensational I haven’t had to make anything up,” stated Arsenault.
A talk like the one on Monday affords Arsenault more than the oppurtunity to cross genres. It also allows her to open channels of discourse that are frowned upon on television.
“I feel like whenever I’m on TV, I sort of have to dumb things down for Grade 3 people, and I’m at the point where I don’t want to do it anymore,” said Arsenault.
When speaking to university crowds, “It can be a higher level of conversation. Not in an art snob kind of way but… it can go to another place,” she said.
The lack of control in television is equally frustrating: “It’s so maddening when some TV producer who’s never met a transsexual before me is telling me how I should be represented.” Television does have an upside, though. She laments that some grassroots documentaries highlight what they feel is the “real” story: generally, the gritty side of her transformation. But, “The real stuff is glamourous,” laughed Arsenault. “Glamour is really — it’s at the heart of me.”
That some people don’t understand her is something she laughs about. She talked about speaking to a Sociology 101 class at a local university, and how “they all thought I was the devil… they weren’t sure if it was a performance or if it was a lecture. But I was sort of like, ‘It’s both a performance and a lecture. Like, get with the program.’”
Of course, Arsenault is exploring topics that are foreign to lots of straight university students; particularly the concept of a male G-spot, and how to stimulate it.
“I notice that some of the straight guys don’t want to keep eye contact with me after I start talking about that stuff. I don’t know if it’s because they’re uncomfortable about it, or it’s because they think about it, or if it’s just… wow, that’s a lot of information.”
Regardless, Arsenault talked excitedly about being in a university environment. “What I’m interested in is… talking to people with open minds; I’m interested in talking to people who are hungry for new ideas; I’m interested in people who want to explore the complications of life… their mind, their body, their being, their breath: the whole thing is turned on.” On Monday, Arsenault will undoubtedly turn on more than a few minds.
Queer Art Diva: an evening of selected writings, monologues and visual art –part performance lecture, excerpts from my plays, new video art, photography, a living-art manifesto and a couple very fabulous dresses
a fundraiser for GLOW, The Queer and Questioning Community Centre at the University of Waterloo
warning: graphic photographic and video images
I’m taking the Contemplative Dance workshop with Denise Fujiwara. My understanding is that this workshop is the precursor to studying butoh, an ever evolving Japanese dance form.
I first saw butoh in 1992 and thought it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life. It has always been something that I wanted to study. So, I am excited to begin this journey partly for the pure pleasure of exploring movement, partly to see what it brings to my own performance art.
Below is a youtube video of Ms. Fujiwara and excerpts of her dance Komachi.
Unfortunately, we do not get to see sustained pieces of her dance, just fragments, but the movement is very beautiful. I suggest watching it full screen so you can watch her face as she dances.
Her website is www.fujiwaradance.com
“To dance is to journey into the secrets of intuition, memory, dreams; to encounter and express the mysteries of human nature as they are manifest in the body, before words.
I believe in the ability of art to move people, to change people, to put people in touch with the best part of their humanity, to remind people of the complexity of their humanity and to cultivate compassion.”
Denise Fujiwara
ABOVE PICTURE: portraying “the disembodied curator” in Kent Monkan’s The Art Game. Because of an optical illusion people couldn’t figure out where my body was, and until I moved many people thought I was a mannequin head
(from azuremagazine.com)
Of Cree and Irish descent, Toronto’s Kent Monkman is renowned for finding extravagantly subversive ways of breaking down social and cultural stereotypes. While his paintings sell for thousands of dollars, his performance art is perhaps more flamboyant. It’s animated by Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, his female alter ego inspired by Native Canadian folklore.
Monkman’s love for spectacle is on full display in The Art Game, which he created especially for Art Toronto. Comprised of a life-sized maze with a ringmaster ushering in viewers, the installation presents a vaudevillian take on the contemporary art world. Within the maze are four rooms, each painted in one of four colours – red, yellow, black or white – representing the sacred shades of Native tradition, according to Monkman. Everywhere else the surrounding white walls are stamped with over-the-top art-biz headlines like “Dumped by collector!” “Venice Biennale solo!” and “Museum acquisition!”
Inspired by old-fashioned circus personae, live performers act out their particular roles in the art world in each room. Dressed like a magician, the Dealer sits in the black room playing cards; in the white room, the Collector wears the head of a raven, a bird that craves shiny objects. In the yellow room, The World’s Most Prolific Artist puts his 12 hands to use churning out paintings. The red room’s Curator, meanwhile, takes the form of a disembodied head that’s “all brains.” It protrudes from a tabletop covered in textbooks.
A slapstick takedown of the business of making, selling and buying art, Monkman’s installation is a refreshing main attraction at an art fair where dealers are schmoozing clientele, collectors are being wined and dined, and curators and artists walk the aisles looking to see what’s sold and what hasn’t.
(PICTURE RIGHT: one of the other inhabitants of the installation. BELOW PICTURE: portraying “the most prolific artist of all time” –the picture doesn’t show you my other six hands (you just see the arms) –all working on different canvases that are all completely (different shades of) yellow and cried. I painted in extreme slow motion and with the other arms moving, it made little kids ask if I was a robot.
I should say that when I put stuff up by other artists it is because I am looking at their stuff and inspired by it. The inspiration isn’t always a literal thing that feeds into my work. Sometimes it is their uncompromising qualities, the fact that they take risks, I find something interesting about what images they are exploring or I just like what they represent.
What I love about Kent Monkan’s work is that he works across so many different media and genres to explore continuing questions about race, sex, camp, glamour, power and authenticity. He also has a wicked sense of humour.
About Kent Monkman
Kent Monkman is a Canadian artist if Cree ancestry who works with a variety of mediums, including painting, film/video, performance, and installation. He has solo exhibitions at numerous Canadian museums including the Montreal Museum of Fine Art, the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto, the Winnipeg Art Gallery, and the Art Gallery of Hamilton. He has participiated in various international group exhibitions. He is represented by Galerie Florent Tsin in Berlin, Bruce Bailey Art Projects in Toronto, Pierre-Francois Ouelletee art contemporain in Montreal and TrepanierBaer Gallery in Calgary.
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Monkman draws on the facts of these events to create a screening gallery of his own, a turn-of-the-century movie theatre that intends to shock and entertain, just as Catlin did. The tipi-come-cinema lures its audience with a sophisticated appeal; inside a chandelier hangs amongst sweeping drapery in a soft glow of light and, on the floor, a stretched (simulated) buffalo hide plays two movies, Group of Seven Inches and Robin’s Hood.
Photo: John Goldstein
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The Monkmanian version of this scene, displayed on five screens in the shape of buffalo hides, shows Miss Chief Eagle Testickle dancing the role of the Berdashe. The choreography, created by Canadian Cree actor, choreographer and dancer Michael Greyeyes, is based on both the traditional powwow and contemporary dance. The music, written by Toronto composer Phil Strong, is a free syncopated version of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, a modern masterpiece also inspired by ancient tribal rituals.
Photo: Montreal Museum of Fine Art, Christine Guest
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These high heeled pumps were worn by Miss Chief in numerous films, videos and performances. They are also displayed as Miss Chief ’s personal effects inside Boudoir de Berdashe.
Photo: Brian Boyle
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Monkman created Séance in response to being censored from the First People’s Gallery at the ROM during the Shapeshifters (link) exhibition. In her conversations with the spirits of 19th century painters, Eugene Delacroix, Paul Kane, and George Catlin, Miss Chief’s costumes grow increasingly larger and more outlandish, as the responses of each successive artist draws more of her ire.
Right-click to download ’Dance to Miss Chief.mp3‘
Photo: Brian Boyle
My one woman show The Silicone Diaries is nominated for a Prix de le Critiques by the Association Québécoise des critiques de théâtre (AQCT). It is nominated in the Hors-Quebec category or “outside Quebec” for productions that originally come from other places. There are two other productions nominated in the same category. They are Yume No Shiro by Potudo-ru (originally from Tokyo, Japan), and Hot Pepper, Air Conditioner, and the Farewell Speech by Toshiki Okada (also originally from Japan). Both of the other productions were shown at the Festival Trans-Amerique. The Silicone Diaries appeared at Theatre La Chapelle (co-produced with Buddies in Bad Times Theatre) in December 2010.
This is very exciting and a great honour. The Montreal production of the play was very special to me. I hope to be able to come back and work in Quebec in the future.
Friday, October 21st, 10am
in The History of Solo Performance
Drama Centre, University of Toronto
(course director: Nikki Cesare)
—a discussion of the French body-artist Orlan, the Cypriot-Australian performance artist Stelarc whose work focuses on extending the capabilities of the human body and Canadian Nina Arsenault’s cosmetic and spiritual exploration of beauty, image and queerness
OPEN TO PhD AND MASTERS LEVEL STUDENTS
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Friday, November 4, 11:30am-1:00pm
Nina Arsenault: Daughter of the Air
Ryerson University Theatre
(organized by Cynthia Ashperger and Judith Rudakoff)
–panel discussion about me and my work by Cynthia Ashperger (the head of Ryerson’s Theatre Dept and an expert on the Michael Chekov Acting Technique) and Judith Rudakoff (scholar, dramaturg, playwright, editor who has worked with me on my stage scripts and who has editted the forthcoming book TRANS(per)FORMING Nina Arsenault: An Unreasonable Body of Work) and myself
OPEN TO RYERSON THEATRE DEPARTMENT STUDENTS
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Wednesday, Nov 21, 7pm-9pm
Nina Arsenault: Queer Art Diva (an evening of selected writings, monologues and visual art)
(organized by GLOW – Gays and Lesbians of Waterloo)
in the Main Theatre, University of Waterloo Theatre Department
OPEN TO ALL UNIVERSITY OF WATERLOO STUDENTS AND THEIR GUESTS
(ticket prices tba – in support of GLOW)
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Wednesday, November 30, 10am
in Praxis: Intersections of Identity in Theory, in Performance (3rd year course)
Brock University
(course director J. Paul Halferty)
CLOSED TALK
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Mon, December 5, 2:30pm
in Performing Gender (4th year course)
York University
(course director J. Paul Halferty)
CLOSED TALK