Faris Cuchi & Mzamo Nondlwana - Operation Dollzzz

#Performance #LGBTQIA*Visibility #GymCulture-Critic #Desirability

OPERATION DOLLZZZ

An artistic performative critique on “Gym culture” and the way in which it detects politics of desirability and visibility among the large LGBTQIA* community. This culture once was used as a tool to disrupt the large sport/gym space that was dominated by cis-hetero men and created subcategories of The Muscle Boy, The older Male, The Poz Jack, The Athlete, The Circuit Boy, and The Mussule Bear that held space that considered “safe” and “libratory” for cis gay men.

As per usual the cis gay men, particularly white ones have left Trans/NB/GNC and femmes bodies behind and become the main agent of discrimination. Such exclusionary work is the embodiment and continuation of cis-hetero men that also excluded cis women.

“Gay gym culture carries a lot of weight (not just literally) because it establishes a social structure and hierarchy, and gay men are increasingly using the parameters of gym culture to identify socially. Our identification within these groups comes quite close to the heart, affecting and to a large extent deciding our choices for friends, sex partners, dates, and even life partners. When it comes to socializing, the gym and our relationships with our bodies are equally as important if not more so as socio-economic status or education level”

The artists Faris Cuchi and Mzamo Nondlwana will sculpt soulful, dazzling, and subversively  gym-themed performances with an intention of taking up space centering aesthetics of Trans/NB/GNC and femmes bodies with

TRANS-Festo is as follows:-

We are here to conquer space.
A space that has excluded us.
We the femmes, the anarchist, the dolls are here to crystalize this space.
This meat market, the gym rat, the place that is only accessible to the masc for mascara, for the gay bears and otters
for the butch masc 
for the “I have put in the work in the gym and maybe you should too”, 
for the meet me in the toilets, 
the abled bodies, 
we are here to destroy and transform this space. 
This space is obsessed with youth. 
We are here to crystallize this space. 
We are here to GLITCH this space that caters to the bodies of defined muscles the tops, bottoms, and sides, 
for the bros. 
We are here to glorify this space with glitter and incense.
We the femmes are here to conquer this gym.