Salons

[susanstinson]

I've seen others on my friendslist writing about how to develop fat culture -- and some of you, such as current and past members of the board of Nolose and fat girl flea organizers, work at it with amazing intensity and persistence, yeah, and of course, there are plenty of writers, artists, activists and thinkers here who are creating culture and challenging existing paradigms in tons of strange, thrilling and persistent ways -- so I thought you might be interested in this exchange. Part of my interest is in how to jump categories and engage with people doing gorgeous, risky work in many forms from all kinds of angles without getting too scattered or neglecting existing relationships or slighting the most intimate and fertile conversations and exchanges.*

In an email, hhholiday asked me a very beautiful and moving question, a question out of my dreams:

How do we, as a community, get to support you as an artist?



I've been thinking about how to answer. That you want to know this is right up there as a pleasure with a swim in an outdoor pond. I take it very seriously. And, god knows, I need and love the smart radical fat queers (among others!) more than I can say. There's a longer answer to this that has to do with teasing out what both the gifts and trials have been for me with various forms of fat liberation. (For instance, there's the conversation I keep having to have with the culture about fiction and why novels matter so much. Fat liberation often reflects the broader culture in treating fiction as an after dinner trifle rather than a medium with enormous potential to transform the stories that individuals, communities and societies tell about themselves.) But, for a start, here's one thing I was thinking this morning:

I'd love for there to be a salon series, maybe quarterly (which beccawrites suggested), somewhere I can get to, like New York City, which wouldn't require the time and money it takes to get to Nolose. It'd be great if there were a series of presenters who are working and thinking seriously in some way about issues related to fat liberation -- this could be defined very broadly -- or, who, maybe, like me, have a history with or a desire to engage deeply and respectfully with a critical analysis of the culture that includes the way fatness is seen and used in general.
I'm imagining people presenting their work and then talking with others about it in a respectful, nuanced, brave way. My preference would be that the participants not be restricted by gender or body size or other identities, but that the expectation of a willingness to engage in the kind of stimulating way that I'm trying to describe would be deep and active enough in the group to create something live and exciting and beautiful (and who KNOWS what that might be, but it might be a lot of things...) And that risk would be valued, but so would be -- what? -- a consciousness of history, of multiple perspectives, empathy, a sense of the real weight our lives have in the world.

These groups would probably need to be small. But there could be many of them happening in many places. They probably already are. It would be great if there was a practice of documenting the presentations and/or discussions or writing up a summary that got posted so that others who couldn't be there could get access to the work and ideas, could get stimulated and respond.

I'd love that. I'd love to read and talk about my work in that context.

I keep going back to thinking about participants versus spectators. Here's Dave Hickey from "Romancing the Looky Loos" in Air Guitar:

[Art] is a mode of social discourse, a participatory republic, an accumulation of small, fragile social occasions that provide the binding agent of fugitive communities. It is made in small places and flourishes in environments only slightly less intimate. So, even if your art ends up in a museum -- even if your "underground rave-performance event' ends up in the Los Angeles Times -- even if your band ends up playing in coliseums -- you may be assured that what is being glorified in public splendor is just the residue, a mere simulacrum from which disinterested spectators may infer the experience of participants.

So, yeah, those small fragile spaces, like Nolose, they matter so much.


* It was pointed out to me this weekend that those existing relationships are a place where this already happens kind of a lot in my life, so it would be truly silly to be inattentive to what I already have in search of some kind of "grass is greener" self conscious construction ...

Comments

[hhholiday.livejournal.com]

i'm sure i will be busy at the Flea, and just as sure that i will benefit GREATLY from taking a 20 minutes break to talk to you somewhere calmer (like, outside!)

glad you like the TCM reference! banking the will is good stuff!

[susanstinson.livejournal.com]

Oh, good! Sounds like a plan!