Say hi to say hi to korean bullies read this. Say hi to say hi to i-D!. Say hi to I Like To Fork Myself. Say hi to RIP.
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Candy may not be the first magazine dedicated to transvestism and transexuality as claimed, but with hot girls like Cole Mohr and Luke Worrall and photographers like Terry Richardson (sorry for my ignorance, that's the only name I know from all the hundred names flashed in the promotional video), it is definitely seizing recognition (attention?) in the contemporary scene. Something different is happening, for better or worse. *Update: Dazed & Confused wants Candy
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If H2O were us, ice could be our body, water could be our identity and steam could be our orientation. /Bruce Lee tells us to become water/
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Don't you just love her. /Filmmaker Sylvia Chang defies gender rules from South China Morning Post/
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Annie Leibovitz's Vanity Fair cover of Tom Ford, Scarlett Johansson and Keira Knightley might have caused a stir, but one should understand Ford's famous for being manipulative of human bodies (see also Fake but she does it well), and he often poses superior beside (nude) beauties, female or male. Along with all other great cover shots the image only proves again the photographer's appropriate depiction of her subjects. If that's not enough a (feminist) defence for Leibovitz, her own project and book, Women, should speak better for her attitude towards female subjects. Initiated and realised by Susan Sontag and Leibovitz, the photographic documents include "a broad spectrum of subjects: a rap artist, an astronaut, two Supreme Court justices, farmers, coal miners, movie stars, showgirls, rodeo riders, socialites, reporters, dancers, a maid, a general, a surgeon, the First Lady of the United States, the secretary of state, a senator, rock stars, prostitutes, teachers, singers, athletes, poets, writers, painters, musicians, theater directors, political activists, performance artists, and business women". Each from all fields is well and equally represented as a woman, a person for her contribution and simple fact of being. We don't see seducing poses but sincere expressions. We see aging and scars, something that may be forbidden on the female body. We see strong physique and facial hair and women with guns and women in mud. We see women with career. We see women in heroic posture. We're not afraid to see ordinary women. We're not afraid to see women of great beauty. We see women. They can be heterosexual or homosexual. They can be transgendered. They can be of different religions or social groups. They have their lives and relationships. Regardless of occupation, social status or appearance, a brief biography is contributed to every single one of them. The whole book is a record of respect. This website has Sontag's introductory essay, interview with Leibovitz and some images from the book. Please read.
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After kidnaps and drips brands face challenge from a princess, Princess Hijab. By using an apparently constrained form of clothing as a symbol almost similar to icons of popular culture, she (let's assume the Princess is a she) speaks counter to manipulative adverts that imply liberation through consumption. The irony plays great chemistry. Click here to read an interview by Menassat (it is unknown how they managed to interview the very hidden Princess). /sources from April/
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At first I was totally amazed at "his" dancing, then I was totally amazed at the editing!
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I (virtually) met Hun, a Facebook friend and she talked about her concern for gender identity. During the conversation she also mentioned other interests such as poetry and mail art. I'm sending this to her recent postcard event. *Remember There is no beauty, only attraction?
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Daniele Buetti's beautiful pieces from Goodfellows / Looking For Love carry a shade of melancholy. Trying not to impose assumptions on the artworks, but through the tender branded skins do we not read series and series of thoughts that easily go into/come from feminist documents?
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Continuing the previous entry on stereotype, this is a note on the paradox of using convention to reinterpret convention, written earlier relating to the project To Wear Or Not To Wear.
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One thing about the former is that it often causes/applies the latter (look at the previous entry)... /Gundam, unknown source/
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Happy Father's Day.
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My friend Elena posted me a promotional postcard of Adam Neate's exhibition. I didn't know the artist before so I googled him. It's good to see Neate cites his wife Waleska as influence, and that he respects her as an artist - a lot. We've heard enough tragic stories of talented women who had relationship with famous talented men. Waleska may not have a glorious representation, but Neate's appreciation is well appreciated.
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Aww how sweet. Let's not be mean today. Such a family really looks lovely - I mean, can be really lovely - I mean, is really lovely, except all the other things are hidden outside the picture - I mean, may be hidden. No, I mean, this is a perfect family with no hidden flaws at all! Good luck, happy mothers! /first Google Images result of "happy mother"/
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I did not say "Are all designers male?". Maybe they include homosexual female couples. And let me think in their way: This is just one line of saying representing one type of expression from some people and does not represent all audience. Even if it sounds a little male centered, it does not show signs of patriarchy nor sexism because first, it talks about loving women which is something good and second, it is absolutely alright if they want to target a certain group of male audience for this issue or all other issues. In fact, it doesn't speak to anyone in particular and does not imply any meaning. The text looks good, so "puristic". This is a design magazine! No, there is no contrary to the previous explanations. /Novum magazine 05/09/
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/Patti Smith on gender/
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a conceptual project of conceptual art
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Handmade and hand painted tote bags by Sin and her mom
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The L Word came to an end. Really. The show that breaks heterosexual norms and lesbian stereotypes has come to the final episode of the final season. The finale may leave one a bit sad and confused, but watching the retrospective, we see again how the female-dominant cast and crew beautifully present a story that's not only about lesbianism but also human relationships, sexuality and gender issues with wisdom, sensitivity and humour. Excuse me for summarising, but you really have to watch it to understand. Whether you are female, male, transgendered, homo/hetero/bi/pan-sexual, there should be something in the show (besides sex scenes) that's for you. Start from episode 1 of season 1 if you haven't watched.
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Milk is such a meaningful name. It's not just a surname. It's the white liquid of life and hope. It doesn't only represent a homosexual male figure, but "the blacks, the Asians, the disabled, the seniors, the us's". It only takes two people to form an "us". Let's hope there will be enough us's to form a big one, a single mass of hope and courage. We should turn the possible into the probable. - It could be too much or unrelated to put in the same entry, but as the only spokesperson for Fortissimo (now) I feel the need to explain ff whenever there's connection in topic. If you've been careful in looking at the ff logo you'd realize breasts in the letter form. Breast represents not only women but also humans, who are mammals and fed by milk. Taken as a symbol of women as it always is, it embodies a wider range of humanity. Same as Milk, the attempt is not unidirectional. You can also see the nipples as noses and breasts as heads. There are two people, two genderless persons coming together. Fortissimo may be feminist, but feminist doesn't mean "female only". We're trying to speak as persons, and speak fortissimo if you may.
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Watching the Oscars, the introductory clip for Best Picture was almost like 40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes on Youtube. It's incredible how they can completely exclude half of the population without realizing. If it wasn't Sean Penn's incredible speech, I would think it was still about Best Actor.
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/comments on this entry from the Feministing Community/ Women are prouder than men, while men are more lustful. A Vatican report states that the two sexes sin differently. Should this be valid, we should bear in mind that it's the difference between Catholic women and Catholic men only. Right, let's continue with the generalization, polarization, exlusion and comparison game - comparison isn't necessarily ridiculous though. The Advertiser offers positive discussion on Buddhism. You know the most deadly sin that is missing from the anouncement, and is shared by both women and men? Reluctance to confess! There is a declining rate of confessions, and Pope Benedict said, "We are losing the notion of sin. If people do not confess regularly, they risk slowing their spiritual rhythm." I guess "we" and "people" include both sexes.
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Kevin Burg posted a 1938 rejection letter from Disney to his grandmother who applied for a position as Inker/Painter. The letter really speaks for itself, and the beautifully printed Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs plays excellent irony on the man-made dreamland.
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Happy Valentine's Day to valentines and singles of all genders and orientations. /Valentine's Day postcard, circa 1910/
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Ugly talent agency /London & New York/ aims to promote (and sell) unconventional beauty. Though it is unlikely that our conception of beauty would turn 180 degrees because of this type of practice, we should be careful not to make it another pole of thinking and stream of stereotyping. Ugly shouldn't be the new beautiful. All kinds of beauty should coexist, all the time. Um...pretty much like how Ugly embraces model-looking models in the Rage brand. /MSNBC's Today talks about Ugly/
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My friend Winnifred had a trip to Beijing and mailed me this postcard. On the back a line was printed: The Chinese population amounted to around 450 million in 1949 when the People's Republic of China was founded. Today it has surpassed 1.3 billion. Crowded picture for huge population. Nothing's wrong. But wait, look again. All of them are men! (Well, if one or two tiny heads of women hide somewhere I can't refute) If we replace them with women, it would definitely look wrong immediately, as if there's some special meaning other than population. A picture of men only wouldn't have that problem. Though it mismatches with the reality that a population consists of men and women (and others), it would never look strange because we've been so brainwashed.
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/Calvin Klein and the underwear revolution from PonyStep/ "Calvin Klein pioneered the objectification of men"? The most recent example I can think of is Caravaggio. Even if CK was responsible for this at all, the destination of its practice would be nothing new but consumption, the ultimate goal of any "innovative" campaigns. From something like the Brooke Shields commercial it is clear that CK intends to provoke rather than to evoke alternative mentalities, though the objectification of men may do a little of that. But do we expect them to contribute to building a healthier set of ideologies (not saying that objectifying men is a healthy thing to do)? No, it is almost ridiculous to. Their job is to make (model) boys and girls look hotter than the cotton pieces on them, and at the same time make them part of the pieces. Nobody is talking about exploitation here. Nor moral. Nor underwear. It's called sexiness. Yes, that thing we want.
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Whether they are discussing the look or the implication, the First Lady has to be first judged by her fashion. What can we say about that. It's women's responsibility. When did you see handsome actors in tuxedos stealing photographers' attention on the red carpet? I have to say, I cannot see the differences between each man's fashion. Evolution of style is a lot easier for the vision-impaired.
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Stam，很多人都這樣說。 杜鵑，不要盼望，《Vogue》應該沒有這個能力。 /Kai Z Feng 圖/
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/Hurricane by Grace Jones/
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As part of and an extension of an exhibition In the name of Victoria, artist Warren Leung Chi Wo presented his project My name is Victoria in a limited edition of 300 elegant books. I was lucky to have one of them. Its content is the same as that of the video work, of women named Victoria telling stories about their names. This is a work to "explore the concept of preservation, not only of information but also the idea of one's identity in relation with others' expectation, perception and memory". "Victoria" can be a political topic in Hong Kong, but from Leung's work, many layers of meanings can be seen. One of them is gender ideologies concerned with nomenclature. We realize not only political implications carried by the name, but also expectation and perception of gender identity, from oneself or other people. The work is available online. I'd like to share a few quotes: Before I started working my friends called me Ah Hoi, a boyish nickname which I invented myself as I didn't consider myself as a feminine kind of girl. So I needed a different nickname to represent the person I wanted to be. I became different after I started working. Everyone changes! I found a more feminine side of myself, and accepted people calling me Victoria, which I wasn't so used to before. I wanted to have an unusual English name. I tried to check the dictionary and found out the meaning. Most of the English names for girls usually mean beautiful, cutie, etc. But, I think this name is different from others. It means Victory. Other than beauiful, I think girls should strive for whatever they want to. However, these friends in college started introducing me to their friends as "Vic", which I didn't like since it sounds too masculine to be the only name someone knows for me. I shortly thereafter switched back to Vicki with any new friends that I made. I was born without an English name and during school I've chosen "Stevie" as my "english name". I've chosen Stevie ever since, espeically after living in America for 5 years my Chinese name has somehow become "the past". The one problem is that Stevie is usually a guy's name and I'm a girl...so people always ask a lot of questions like, "why Stevie?" or, "but isn't it a guy's name?..." One night while out drinking with a friend we decided that we'll have a "party name" and I picked Victoria and have adopted that as my middle name since then.
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Aesthetics crosses disciplines. This man crosses disciplines and joins them into one. Talented souls do exist in the commercial world (and what is not commercial?). If you look closely, a brand name can't cheat you into buying, neither can it blind you to appreciating. The judgement lies in your own hands (brain). /Hedi Slimane's Diary/
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Merry Christmas to all stereotypes. You are our reason for argument. /photograph from a vintage item stand/
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Nan Goldin is someone that we cannot miss when it comes to gender identity (and a lot more). /Goldin on her work, part 1 & part 2/
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Miranda July has the right sensitivity to relationship and sexuality to make you the one who belongs.
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Spare 45 minutes for the witty mind.
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"I wonder why men can get serious at all. They have this delicate long thing hanging outside their bodies, which goes up and down by its own will. First of all having it outside your body is terribly dangerous. If I were a man I would have a fantastic castration complex to the point that I wouldn't be able to do a thing. Second, the inconsistency of it, like carrying a chance time alarm or something. If I were a man I would always be laughing at myself. Humour is probably something the male of the species discovered through their own anatomy. But men are so serious. Why? Why violene? Why hatred? Why war? If people want to make war, they should make a colour war, and paint each others city up during the night in pinks and greens. Men have an unusual talent for making a bore out of everything they touch. Art, painting, sculpture, like who wants a cast-iron woman, for instance." - /Grapefruit by Yoko Ono/
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Chen Lingyang presented her personal expression truly beautifully through Twelve Flower Months (2000). Her use of metaphor and visual treatment not only carries thoughts of Chinese culture, but more importantly, handles the taboo very delicately. The following website may have destroyed the poetic quality of her work, but here we can see the whole series to get a gesture of it. Please view.
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"As children, we're programmed into the limitations of gender distinction: little boys to be fighters, little girls to be pretty and nice. But as we grow older, there's a self-awareness that sees gender as a decision, as something malleable. You can play with the traditional options - dressing up, cruising in cars, the tough posturing - or play against the roles, by displaying your tenderness or toughness to contradict stereotypes. When I was fifteen, the perfect world seemed a place of total androgyny, where you wouldn't know a person's gender until you were in bed with him or her. I've since realized that gender is much deeper than style. Rather than accept gender distinction, the point is to redefine it. Along with playing out clichés, there is the decision to live out the alternatives, even to change one's sex, which to me is the ultimate act of autonomy." - /The Ballad of Sexual Dependency by Nan Goldin/
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Yes, commercials always say that we suck. So why not believe it. They may have used tricks to avoid negative social proof, but why don't we apply it ourselves. Models and actresses in commercials say they have all sorts of skin problems until some miracle comes in product form. Even they have those problems. Why shouldn't we? And about the cure - you don't believe in miracles, do you?
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"Power is a matter of perception", says [Roberta] Smith. "At the moment it's about money. People can take power, they can demand it. It doesn't change in the structure unless perception changes." - /Female Trouble from ArtReview magazine: The Power 100 (2008)/ Click here to read the whole article.
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/this entry got quite a lot of comments from the Feministing Community/ I'm having a period. It started yesterday and the beginning was extremely uncomfortable this time. Today I went to browse all the different-but-similar fancy packages for at least 5 minutes untill I guessed I got the right ones. During the process I could not help but thought of a line implanted in my mind through some sort of extraterrestrial contact - Have a happy period. A sentence like this is alien, so alien it may be alien to aliens. On which planet is a period happy? I checked their tips on how to have a happy period. They seem to be advices on releasing stress than gaining happiness, or simple regimes for being healthy. No words about pads. The hope of using a particular brand to solve any menstrual "unhappiness" is collasped and gone. Oh but there are heating pads (particularly from ThermaCare) that "will let you leave the house and participate fully in your life"! Sounding good? Having a pond of blood in my tummy, I sat still and went to the local website. Though most of the discussions are plain laughable there is one that might be interesting: What will the world be if men menstruate?. Most say men will be more understanding of women. Some say it will be fair. Some say it is nice, while others worry about dangerous consequences for men to be more irritated than they always are. But I like this one the most: Sales of sanitary pads will grow immensely. Another question in the discussion board is whether boyfriends or husbands have bought pads for us, assuming girls and women are all men-loving, or have a cute-enough spouse to be called 老公仔. Right. Prince Charming's are all around and we can (and should) simply wait for them to pick us up (maybe when we are having a happy period).
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My friend said The Duchess was boring, but I found it rather moving. Despite the plot being quite predictable, it did make me cry for several times. Why would a story set in the 18th century compel? Because it still applies. Not saying that this movie is the special case that tells a message by presenting what might happen in the past. There are numerous examples, be it creative, academic or whichever type on whatever topic, that try to speak today's problems by depicting yesterday's. This happens because, no matter how many times we are reminded, there are always fragments of human nature that are prone to unacceptable deeds (that are often accepted).
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"I like the idea of growing up and being a woman - the end of childhood but keeping part of your nature," said Sofia Coppola, the director (no "female director" or "woman director" here) who sensitively captures the hearts and minds of young women, in an IHT interview.
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Kimberly Rydzewski quit America's Next Top Model (Cycle 10) because she did not have interest in the fashion industry. It might seem ridiculous to a lot of people why this girl chose to be there in the first place, but the reactions of judges and model wannabees were more comedic than the offered elimination itself. What's to be so appalled? It's always in the middle of a relationship that we realize something is wrong.
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Crazy graphic assemblage AND with sound.
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Here is Dita Von Teese's comment on women as sex objects in Indie Sex: "I think that historically, women have always been viewed as beautiful, sexual objects. And I know a lot of people don't want to hear that, and they don't want that, and they feel like it's a feminist view that we shouldn't be portrayed as sex objects, but this is... We've been sex objects for hundreds of years. It's not gonna change. And I say if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Everyone fantasizes about being a sex object every once in a while. I can't imagine anyone, in their deepest, darkest, most sexual fantasies, they're wishing that someone loved them or that someone cared about their mind or having an intellectual conversation. When it comes down to it, we're animals, in a way. We just want to be, like, sex objects. And so I just feel historically it's not something new. It's not like suddenly women are being portrayed in this way, where they just wanna show us all topless and show us as sexual creatures. It's been going on forever." I love Dita's way of showing her own beauty and sexual attraction without disguising them with pseudo-righteous masks. Feminism doesn't mean being cold and clothed in front of the camera or erasing make-up and breaking heels of high heels. It should help embrace all sexual qualities (including patriarchal stereotypes, yes) that possibly exist in this world - and all sexes that exist in this world, and treat them fairly. Apparently some people handle men's sexual organ more strictly than they do for women's: (Dana Stevens) "There's an early scene in the film [Young Adam] when Ewan McGregor goes down on Tilda Swinton on a riverbank right out in the open. You could make a feminist argument that that's an unusual scene to see in movies, and that it might be the content of that scene more than the raciness that pushed that movie into NC-17 territory. I would imagine that implied female-on-male oral sex might be more acceptable to censors, you know? It seems to be happening all the time in R-rated movies. The outcry also had to do with the extensive nudity by Ewan McGregor, although you never see him with a hard-on." (Peter Sarsgaard) "The ratings board can only handle so much penis. They can handle a lot of tits and ass. If you have a penis in a movie, you get a certain amount of time with that penis before you become NC-17." (Alonso Duralde) "For some reason, the penis is still forbidden territory. It's just that... It's that last line that nobody wants to cross." So penis and nude man must be quite a thing. That's why we have nude men introduced at ff! Let's make men sex objects too and appreciate their dic...penises and gaze at them all the time. I believe they want that too, for if women don't see them as sex objects (or subjects, whatever they want) or if women have no sexual interest in them, they won't have the chance to be the studs they'd love to label themselves as. Go, strip men in movies and in real life!
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This is a picture from my friend Joyce, of her classmates in secondary school (I hope they don't mind me posting). It made her think of ff. Naturally I'm putting it here. Joyce said (maybe casually, in MSN) she was terrified how Form 2 girls back in 1994 knew what hot bodies were. I don't know if this picture shows their concept of hot body, but I'm curious what game they were playing, for there was only one "male". It reminds me of an image in which Tom Ford appears to be the creator of the clothes (called "fashion") and the models. I wonder if it is the case, when women dominate in number, they are usually in a supporting role. Fashion designer and models, doctor and nurses, pilot and flight attendants (formerly "air hostesses")...I can't name a reverse case now. Not that I hope cases are reversed, but one can't deny the P word is still all around.
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