Found/Fabric Lab
🗓️ Wednesday, 24 June — 12:50pm
- 1:30pm
(40 mins)
Presenters
Image
Abstract
How might trans construction preserve and sustain the endangered conceptual world of trans liberation? Within Found/Fabric Lab, we will explore the potential for trans construction by testing sample materials, methods and processes of trans construction. “Found,” here refers both to the ground (foundation) which is the basis for construction and that which has been sought or studied (finding/s); when, how and where trans construction is situated. “Fabric,” referring both to building-work (fabrication) and the stuff we use to get dressed everyday, becomes a subject for deeper investigation via its found-ness.
We understand trans construction as an emergent tactic for developing physical spatial infrastructure for trans liberation, as well as language to recover from trans liberation’s institutional expropriation. Whereas normative construction typically creates records of attempts – to frame, gather, house, re/store, exchange, insulate, etc – we understand trans construction to also involve “an often, sometimes chaotic, but hopefully ultimately space-clearing attempt,” as Cameron Awkward-Rich put it. That is to say, we believe trans construction’s viability lies not only in its production of positive forms but also in its delicate attention to negative spaces’ previously unrecognized relevance. In practicing this durational art of epistemologically encouraging trans liberation, we illuminate the powerful influence of cis-masc and hetero-normative perspectives in deciding what is safe, what is sturdy, what is beautiful, what is functional and livable in the built environment.
In this session, we will discuss the body’s inherent capacity to be gendered differently, and consider ways in which construction can already be conceived of as trans. Participants are likewise invited to test the inherent capacities of common and uncommon construction materials to regenerate trans cultures and ecologies.
We understand trans construction as an emergent tactic for developing physical spatial infrastructure for trans liberation, as well as language to recover from trans liberation’s institutional expropriation. Whereas normative construction typically creates records of attempts – to frame, gather, house, re/store, exchange, insulate, etc – we understand trans construction to also involve “an often, sometimes chaotic, but hopefully ultimately space-clearing attempt,” as Cameron Awkward-Rich put it. That is to say, we believe trans construction’s viability lies not only in its production of positive forms but also in its delicate attention to negative spaces’ previously unrecognized relevance. In practicing this durational art of epistemologically encouraging trans liberation, we illuminate the powerful influence of cis-masc and hetero-normative perspectives in deciding what is safe, what is sturdy, what is beautiful, what is functional and livable in the built environment.
In this session, we will discuss the body’s inherent capacity to be gendered differently, and consider ways in which construction can already be conceived of as trans. Participants are likewise invited to test the inherent capacities of common and uncommon construction materials to regenerate trans cultures and ecologies.
Biography
Doors Unlimited was initiated in 2015 by Bethany Ides & Ora Ferdman with Mahshid Rafiei as a generative structure for hosting collaborative research in convocational technologies and speculative folklife. Doors Unlimited events often engage large groups of people walking, eating, reading, diagramming, discussing, experimenting, play-acting, planning, drawing, laughing, listening and/or deciding together. Previous projects have occurred in community centers, art galleries, academic institutions, private residences, theaters and public, open spaces across the U.S. and Canada, as well as online.
Ora Ferdman is a 3rd-generation builder and designer, investigating the social, political, and performative dimensions of construction practice. She is the recipient of fellowships by Benjamin Menschel Program for Creative Inquiry, the Good Work Institute and the New Inc Program. As part of Doors Unlimited, she has been an artist-in-residence at/with Sense Lab, Habitable Spaces and the Prattsville Art Center.
Ora Ferdman is a 3rd-generation builder and designer, investigating the social, political, and performative dimensions of construction practice. She is the recipient of fellowships by Benjamin Menschel Program for Creative Inquiry, the Good Work Institute and the New Inc Program. As part of Doors Unlimited, she has been an artist-in-residence at/with Sense Lab, Habitable Spaces and the Prattsville Art Center.
