Jeannine Tang and Reina Gossett with Eric Stanley and Chris Vargas:Love Revolution, Not State Collusion

Thursday June 7, 2012, 7:30 pm
New Museum Theater, NYC
Free
… http://www.newmuseum.org/events/645

As transgender issues, artists, and theory have received greater recognition in contemporary art discourses and institutions since the 2000s, activist Reina Gossett, art historian Jeannine Tang will discuss the role of art and artists in recent movement building, and how contemporary art figures in critical trans politics today. This will feature a screening of the film “Criminal Queers,” followed by a conversation with filmmakers Eric A. Stanley and Chris Vargas.

“Criminal Queers” visualizes a radical trans/queer struggle against the prison industrial complex and toward a world without walls. Remembering that prison breaks are both a theoretical and material practice of freedom, this film imagines what spaces might be opened up if crowbars, wigs, and metal files become tools for transformation. By expropriating the “prison break” genre the question of form and content collapse into a rhythm of affective histories as images of possibility materializes even after possibility itself is foreclosed. Follow Yoshi, Joy, Susan and Lucy as they fiercely read everything from the Human Rights Campaign and hate crimes legislation to the non-profitization of social movements. Criminal Queers grows our collective liberation by working to abolish the multiple ways our hearts, genders, and desires are confined.

This event is supported by the New Museum, Sylvia Rivera Law Project, and the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice.

A parallel conversation on recent organizing and movement building will be hosted by Sylvia Rivera Law Project on Friday, June 8 at 6pm.

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Reina Gossett is a trans activist working at the Sylvia Rivera Law Project as Director of Membership and was formerly director of the Welfare Organizing Project at Queers for Economic Justice as well as a Soros Justice Fellow on staff at Critical Resistance.|

Eric A. Stanley works at the intersections of radical trans/queer aesthetics, theories of state violence, and visual culture. While completing a PhD in the History of Consciousness department at UCSC, Eric along with Chris Vargas, directed the films Homotopia (2006) and Criminal Queers (2012) which have been screened at Palais de Tokyo, LACE, Centre for Contemporary Arts Glasgow and SF Cameraworks among numerous other venues. Eric is also the editor of Captive Genders: Trans Embodiment and the Prison Industrial Complex (AK Press, 2011) which was recenlty selected as a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award.

Jeannine Tang is an art historian teaching as Academic Advisor at the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, while completing her doctoral work at the Courtauld Institute of Art.

Chris E. Vargas is a film and video maker based in Oakland, CA, whose thematic interests include queer radicalism, transgender hirstory, and imperfect role models. He earned his MFA in Art Practice from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2011. Since 2008, he has been making, in collaboration with Greg Youmans, the web-based trans/cisgender sitcom Falling In Love…with Chris and Greg. Episodes of the series have screened at numerous film festivals and art venues, including MIX NYC, SF Camerawork, and the Tate Modern. With Eric Stanley, Vargas co-directed the movie Homotopia (2006) and its feature-length sequel Criminal Queers (2012). His solo video projects include Extraordinary Pregnancies (2010), Liberaceón (2011), and ONE for all… (2012).

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During the run of the exhibition “Museum as Hub: Carlos Motta: We Who Feel Differently,” Motta invites local queer artists, activists, and academics to hold public events on select Thursday evenings in the Museum as Hub. Events include a conversation about transgender issues in contemporary art, a lecture on queer and feminist theologies, a workshop on HIV/AIDS activism today, a “cruising” walk, a presentation of a book about queer responses to gay inclusion in the military, and a collective reading of queer texts, all of which address critical issues of contemporary queer culture in the United States.
FB event page is here.
http://www.newmuseum.org/events/643

Criminal Queers Community Screening and Discussion

Friday June 8th at 7 PM
147 West 24th Street, 5th Floor
Free, All Are Welcome. Building has an elevator.

On Friday evening come join filmmakers Eric A Stanley & Chris Vargas for a screening of the film CRIMINAL QUEERS. We’ll be discussing the role of art and artists in movement building, and how art helps shape trans politics today. The screening will be followed by a conversation with filmmakers Eric A. Stanley and Chris Vargas.

Supported by Sylvia Rivera Law Project, the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice & Queers for Economic Justice

There is a FB event page here.

contact Reina Gossett for more details:
rmgossett at gmail.com