Society has taught us that there are only two possibilities when it comes to the issue of gender: Everyone in the world is either a man or a woman. There are certain guidelines that dictate how people are supposed to fulfill their designated role. However, there are some people who feel that they do not fit neatly into either of these categories.
This gray area is often expressed through the act of cross−dressing, which becomes a way for individuals to express their identities outside of the sex they were assigned at birth. These gender explorations have led to exciting new forms of art, especially in the mediums of film and photography, and they are the subject of a new exhibition at the MIT List Visual Arts Center, titled "Virtuoso Illusion: Cross−Dressing and the New Media Avant−Garde."
This show explores role−playing that asks questions about the fluidity of sex and gender and why certain aspects of culture are deemed masculine or feminine. To investigate identity and societal conditioning, artists interested in avant−garde practices and ideas have taken on the issues of gender and cross−dressing as subjects for their work.
This exhibition was organized by guest curator Michael Rush, former director of the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, and it fills the List Center with a plethora of sights and sounds that overwhelm viewers from the moment they enter the space. The show features the work of over 15 artists, ranging from the iconic figure of Andy Warhol to lesser−known contemporary artists like John Kelly.
Although the works chosen for the exhibition are diverse, there is a cohesive theme to the show that ties all the pieces together and creates an exciting lens through which to view them. Each of the artists explores the meaning of gender identity in a unique way. The pieces ask about what happens when one crosses the invisible line that leads into the oft−misunderstood areas of cross−dressing, homosexuality and role−playing.
The exhibition, though it has some photography, is dominated by films, which leads to an overwhelming number of sounds competing for space and attention. Although this can be distracting and frustrating at times, it lends to the eerie quality that permeates the entire show, with a cacophony of voices and melodies blending together as visitors walk through the winding space.
Upon entering the exhibition, viewers immediately encounter pieces that are undeniably controversial, yet easily relatable to the history of art, such as a work by Yasumasa Morimura, a Japanese artist born in 1951, titled "Futago." This giant framed photograph, made in 1989−90, depicts a double self−portrait of the artist in the exact setting depicted in Édouard Manet's "Olympia" (1863). Morimura plays the role of both the white prostitute and the black maid in this composition, and in doing so appropriates the power of Western art for himself, a Japanese man. As a man, his nude figure is confrontational and offsetting when he plays a woman, but the kitschy feel of the work makes it digestible, even for those with relatively conservative taste.
As viewers progress through the show, many of the works become darker and more disturbing. This exhibition is not one for the faint of heart, but it is well worth the uncomfortable feelings it provokes. It frankly discusses a subject that is very present in the world, yet is relegated to the outskirts of society and receives very little attention.
Films such as Michelle Handelman's "Dorian" mesmerize viewers while simultaneously repelling them, due to the subject matter and style of the work. Handelman chose to display her film on four large, overlapping screens, which keep the eye jumping from place to place in order to depict the dark underworld of cross−dressing, lesbianism and drug abuse. Her unabashed yet stylistically beautiful depiction of a woman as she is pushed deeper into self−obsession and addiction tells a story that not many people want to hear, but that desperately needs to be heard.
Seeing life through the eyes of these artists and their many different personas creates a show unlike anything most viewers have ever seen. It is intimately personal, while maintaining an air of isolated detachment, and it has the ability to evoke both laughter and tears.
Do not expect to walk quickly through this show, as its many films take hours to watch in their entirety. This should not be a deterrent, since each piece is a poetic destruction of the binary division that categorizes everyone.
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Virtuoso Illusion: Cross-Dressing and the New Media Avant-Garde
At the Hayden, Reference and Bakalar Galleries, through April 4
MIT List Visual Arts Center
20 Ames St., Bldg. E15, Cambridge
617-253-4680
