Fluid Gender

The readings and discussion made me really consider gender as something less solid and more transient than what I grew up understanding. In my response art, I wanted to create a piece that evoked the sense of moving through spaces with ease, with fluidity. I went to a college that very much celebrated diversity, especially in sexuality. Androgyny was a common style and there used to be a running joke of the "Smith Cut", when freshman would chop off their long locks. It was very different from the town I grew up in which was fairly conservative and where the gender roles were more set.

Thinking back to high school when establishing gender (or rather, the "right" gender) seemed the utmost important made the performance reading easy to relate to. Putting on the costume of what was most fashionable, applying the makeup, playing the part...all of it was really a performance of gender. The reading also cited the Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo. Coming from a dance background, I was already familiar with this dance company of ballerinos in drag performing classical ballet and also a symbol of fluid gender. On the surface, I see them as a satirical comedy but the fact that they can pull it off so well further shows that gender is something we can put on, something that we can perform.