Lao Xie Xie is not the first white individual to appropriate and profit from a historically marginalised culture, and sadly he is very unlikely to be the last. The question we are trying to ask, is that how and why does the global art industry repetitively allow individuals like LXX to penetrate spaces that were made for the marginalised, and perpetuating the Western clichés of poc stereotypes? When the mainstream culture expresses a growing interests in poc art, it also reveal a fundamental lack of understanding and respect of poc cultures. Who has the right to tell a culture’s story? Why are some of the narratives failed to be showcased to the international audience, while others only made their way out after the process of being edited or misinterpreted? How do we tear open spaces for poc artists to showcase works that reflect their experiences and realities without being filtered, distorted or muted by the system’s sadly-still-very orientalist and colonialist gaze? I have no answers yet, but hope Lao Xie Xie will show accountability to own up the outcome of his own actions. Thank you Gavin Marcus for inviting me to contribute to this article. And thank you to Radii, Tommy Kha, Pixy Liao and all the creative individuals who expressed your opinions that built into this piece, whether you were named or left anonymous.
Archiving a past work that holds intimately to my life. A conversation about chronic pain and those who live and love at the centre of it. What picture it paints to live in the reminder of pain on a daily, hourly and minutely basis and how the experience alienates and dissects one’s relationship with their body. What picture it paints to live as their loved ones, tiptoeing a constantly changing boundary testing empathy through the expectations and nature of love.
queerboxd 二号。beautiful tattoo by the talented @weakknees.png it really reminds me of a Shū fǎ paragraph of moss, thin tree branches soaked in summer mountain springs, cool wet stones and red dragonflies. Thank you for the generous and wholesome afternoon spent together.
Sometimes I think I share too much and sometimes too little, but any fragmented, opinionated, broken sappy or wind-whirling emotional documentations of queer experiences should be kept somewhere so why not here! My inner space is so large, zigzagged and paused in between languages and time sometimes I forget the outside world exists and I have to deal with it. Welcome to the queerboxd series, this is how i cope.
Archiving this video taken in my grandparents’ kitchen in Old Timber Factory, Ili. It was taken before the day of my grandpa’s funeral when my grandma, my mum and I were working together to maintain the functionality of this household. Wearing my grandma’s cooking jacket, listening to my mother calling out her mum, the three of us converse with easy, comfort and intimacy. The Timber Factory will be demolished soon to accommodate Ili’s urban planning. But the frosty window, the sensation of my nose blazed by gas stove, and the crunch of crushing a dried chilli, the aroma it evaporated when dropped into the wok will forever live in this video.
