GEMINI
“GEMINI” is a narrative animation about two interconnected souls, exploring the unique bond that trans feminine and trans masculine people share. The narrative follows the characters through the coming of age process; exploring the specific loss of innocence gender queer people endure during this time. “GEMINI” imagines a reality where a trans masculine soul and trans feminine soul are forcibly separated in adolescence – but reconnect through their shared trans identity as adults.
The narrative takes place in a garden, and draws on motifs from The Garden of Eden to tell a story of a loss of innocence. The Garden of Eden represents a sight of innocence transformed into something impure. This process of transformation parallels the emotional turbulence puberty can cause gender queer people. After Adam and Eve eat the forbidden fruit they become self-conscious of their own nudity and feels shame about their bodies. Puberty can cause gender queer people similar discomfort in the form of gender dysmorphia. In this story, the forbidden fruit gives the characters’ knowledge that prevents them from assimilating with their peers. However, it is also the knowledge from the forbidden fruit that eventually leads them back to each other.
“GEMINI” draws on a growing body of existing themes and techniques from my art practice. Appropriating institutional interpretations of religion and spirituality, and juxtaposing these motifs with key moments in the queer experience, is a growing theme in my work. This animation makes use of a 3D scanning and editing technique I am exploring – intentionally distorting LiDAR scans of humans to exaggerate the emergent artifacts the scans’ produce. The distortion of these scans parallels the ways gender queer people’s identities are distorted by a world that is increasingly hostile towards their existence.
“GEMINI” was featured in the Untitled: Artist Takeover Event “Hanging Around Bilagaána” at the Denver Art Museum on 7/28/23.
