La Nuit et Le Jour, 2022
essay: on the research and development process
"La Nuit et Le Jour", which means day and night, is a biographical essay film to rethink the stereotyped butch/femme lesbian representations, that may possibly be abiding to the masculine/feminine heternormativity through the play of the binaural gendered attributes of the French language.
The narrative is divided into three main chapters, which first start with addressing femme lesbians’ struggles caused by the current understanding of lesbianism by heterosexuals by citing a letter to a straight female friend of mine, asking “who is the man” in my previous relationship. Thus, it proposes the urge to maintain the feminine attribute of femme lesbians in opposing the binaural understanding of gender roles in romantic relationships by heteronormativity.
For the second chapter, a self-reflection on my habit of using a handy camcorder is examined with the male gaze and visual pleasure theory proposed by Laura Mulvey, which suggests the coexistence of femininity and masculinity in an individual. It can be intertextually read with a letter written to a crush who claimed herself as a bisexual woman, and inspired me to reflect on how to live as a hybrid of femininity and masculinity.
Last but not least, the last chapter discusses a way to reconcile the suggested disdain of excessive masculinity performed by a specific group of lesbians with a materialistic feminist approach. Instead of conforming to the binaural myth of gender and language, we should be playing with these myths by blurring binaural oppositions, drawing a new territory in between, as to open up for more room of imagination.
Exhibition
Kill Time Trash_temp, 2022, Seoul, Korea
