This quarterly zine assembles both Queeridentified and allied artists, writers, thinkers and the Queer community at large in an effort to multiply current definitions and interpretations of Queerness. In this issue we are exploring, expanding upon and exploding current conceptions of Queer Utopia and Nihilism. Both concepts suggest a relationship to time, distance, desire, form, duration and trajectory. 3rd language is currently seeking participants in this submission-based conversation. Points of interest included but are not limited to: - Queer temporality and survival - Immanence - Romanticization of domesticity and Western ideals - Economic optimism and pessimism - Geographies of hopelessness - Ideals, morality and beauty - Manifestation of a Queer world - Lineage and artifacts of the past and future - (Re)production and fertility
EDITOR’S NOT E 3rd language seeks to contribute conversations that re-imagine nihilism and utopias in ways that may not be addressed elsewhere. We provide a platform for emerging voices that might otherwise go unheard. Because of the topics this zine explores, we would like to acknowledge that some content might be seen as highly emotional, charged and challenging. Some works featured can be triggering to some readers. We are not placing trigger warnings on individual pieces because we understand that triggers are unique and different for many people. If you have any questions or concerns please forward them to Zine@3rd-language.com
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zavé martohardjono is a brooklyn-‐based video artist, performer, and writer. His current multimedia performance series, autogeography, remixes Indonesian mythology, postcolonial re-‐tellings of History, loose autobiography, and notes on process. Having fallen in love with the postwar Japanese movement form butō as part of research for this series, notes on ankoku butō [1] (materials: ink on tracing paper) came to be. notes on ankoku butō [1] -‐ 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 zavemartohardjono.com | zzzag.m@gmail.com Amara Leipzig is a Chicago based artist, writer and illustrator from Los Angeles, CA. Through comics, books and print, their work investigates indeterminacy, non-‐space, perception and identity. "Re-‐Genesis," "Stutter," "Double Vision," and "Archaeologist" investigate a series of characters' struggles to navigate their world, without memory of a past. As their identities are formed, different diagrammatic methods of visualizing identity and human connection reveal what the characters often cannot articulate through words. Re-‐Genesis -‐ cover, Archaeologist -‐ 1, Stutter -‐ 2, Double Vision -‐ 3 amaraleipzig.tumblr.com . NIC k. is an artist, actor and activist from NYC. They are currently residing in Chicago and working as a teaching artist. Why you wanna fly? and The Phoenix are two works developed in exploration of Black rage. Why you wanna fly -‐ 27, The Phoenix -‐ 28 nic-‐kay.tumblr.com | kornegay.nic@gmail.com Amina Ross is a queer brown femme art-‐maker, writer and budding community organizer. The untitled “artifacts of lineage” presented in this issue of 3rd Language zine are small studies of candy, personal history and their refuse. untitled artifact of lineage #1 -‐ 5 , untitled artifact of lineage #2 -‐6 , Potentialities of a Body -‐ 11 aminaross@live.com As a writer and an artist Ashley McClenon’s greatest desire is to tell a story. Her interests in the surreal, the grotesque, the alluring and the absurd drives her to test the boundaries of how to tell a story by mimicking the everyday examination of our own limits. Often times we must re experience trauma to escape it. As All Girls Do tells the story of an emotionally repressed teenage girl whose physical condition becomes a sudden reminder of her presence during moments of sexual promiscuity; reconnecting her inner self with her outer being. As All Girls Do -‐ 15 amccleno9@gmail.com
Griffin Miller is a twenty-‐year-‐old comics illustrator and multi-‐media artist from Angola, Indiana currently studying at SAIC. Griffin’s works explore the juxtaposition of plant life and the human body, and the similarity and differences between these two natural structures. Griffin is fascinated with housing structures and conceptions of "home and safety" and how these notions manifest themselves in dreams and bleed though the unconscious into reality. Plant Man & Plant Man 2 -‐ 22 House -‐ 24 griffinmiller.tumblr.com Justin Allen is an undergraduate poetry and nonfiction student at Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts in New York City. Outside of school he writes for a zine called BAD GRAMMAR and is a regular contributing writer for Afro-‐Punk. Justin's piece "Cognates" explores the complexities of cultural, political and linguistic differences through a mixing of English and untranslated Spanish. Cognates -‐ 30 justn.alln@gmail.com Jory Drew, b. 1992, in Austin, Texas, is currently pursuing his BFA at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Drew collages peculiar private statements with fragmented images as well as delves into childhood portraits of himself to spark conversations on material, light and act of metamorphosis. Mixing ideological qualms with his own personal narratives, Drew's work is a cathartic visual recitation of his life and is largely influenced by his sexually stifled past. First Kiss...2013 -‐ 7, For you to Justify... 2013 -‐ 8, Self-‐portrait in the Butterfly Garden, 2012 (Figure 1&2) -‐ 9,10 jdrew2@saic.edu Arjuna Capulong is a time-‐based artist residing in Chicago, Illinois, often working with performance, installation, video, and photography. Body image, empathy, and vulnerability are subjects he commonly wrestles with, often by means of durational tasks, tension through anticipation, and artist-‐audience dialogue. 12 junagraphy.com Aric Crafford is a Chicago-‐based artist whose work is influenced by technological accidents, artistic-‐process and cheesy, movie effects. Digested Womb 2013 (Holographic Fabric, Polyester, Melted Plastic, Mylar) -‐ 13, Peel #2 2012 (Inkjet Print on Plastic) -‐ 14, Unripe 2012 (Plastics, Yarn, Light) -‐ 26 ariccrafford@gmail.com
JT Bruns is based in the midwest and creates artwork that explores the potential for universal experiences within personal relationships. Many works draw influence from the audience and other artists to ignite an evolving conversation about power and relationships. Fade Into Me (2013, Laser cut paper stack, endless copies.) -‐ 23 joetbruns@gmail.com
Paul Smith is a writer and researcher exploring the essay and the active lecture. His work revolves around guilt, obsession, disruption and repetition. Paul is from Michigan, and currently resides in Chicago, Illinois where he is studying at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago 25 psmith8@saic.edu
Mitchell Mittelstedt is a writer and filmmaker whose work explores how we use language (and how language uses us) to make sense and build narratives, which thrive on the conflicts between them and which from there build encompassing narratives, of which idea his piece "Here S oon" is a short portrayal. Here Soon -‐ 29 mmitte@saic.edu
Elizabeth Merritt Kong is a queer, bi-‐racial, Asian American who was born and raised in Southern California. She has been creating things since emerging from the womb twenty-‐two years ago. Currently attending the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she is on a continuous creative voyage to articulate thoughts, battle normality, examine patterns, decolonize and collect vitamin D. 16 killerelefant@gmail.com Joel Mercedes is an artist, currently exploring: imaginary, collective and personal memories. Untitled is a piece that attempts to retell multiple dreams, relating to ideas of diaspora. 4 Pelenegro.tumblr.com / joelmercedes_25@hotmail.com
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The documents revealed that el Jefe injected himself with bleach, dreaming of turning a yellowish porcelain complexion dragging around in heels La Dama yells “Tengo catorce años con el pelo malo” as she mounts the wax, tar and hair covered blower on the tip of the wooden shelves Salivating this moment of being able to bathe in the beaches of Boca Chica, finally! These memories are hummed every now and then At midnight we saw the ravens dip their wings in powder Their ebony sheen is seen now in antique photographs Blue black eyes a stack of bones sullen turtle like pace She is flying now Blk mn re beutfl
Our bodies are disposable, our melanin is collected in jars Pornographic desires of chocolate thugs breaking bones To season the bland establishments Eh?
Yiya te amo
(sigh)
brothertobrothertobrothertobrothertobrothertobrothertobrothertobrother Mahogany blues Hermano negro de colonial
Morir Soñando No solo de Mi Quisqueya Pero de tu piel canela oscura Moreno fly Negro fly tu belleza, tu mente intelectual tus pestañas largas
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The Potentialities of a Body: An Interview with interdisciplinary artist Arjuna Capulong regarding his One Year Performance. Conducted by artist, writer and 3rd Language member Amina Ross
Amina Ross: Could you briefly explain your One Year Performance? Not necessarily in terms of content but logistically? Arjuna Capulong: I created the piece as a catalyst for producing even more work throughout my year. I just looked at things that I felt like I needed to fix in my life or improve on, to help me so to say "maximize my potential". That phrase "maximizing potential" comes from my father telling me: you need to maximize your potential, you have this talent you need to maximize it. That's kind of where the inspiration for the whole piece came from. AR: What does potential mean to you? AC: I intentionally leave potential undefined in the statement itself. I wanted people to be able to place their own idea of potential into the piece. I wanted the piece to be able to be performed, not only by myself, but by anyone who looks at the manifesto. For me potential is just this vague Idea I get from my father, whenever he says you need to maximize your potential. I haven't been able to explain it in words but when he says it to me I know what it means. AR: I'm interested in the way in which your piece illustrates ideas or whether it perpetuates ideas of success as they apply to western society. I kind of wanted to know where you fit within negotiating that framework of success and failure? Preliminary Performance: Capulong preparing legs to be shaven in preparation for One-Year Performance 2012-2013. Photo by Tyler James AC: Ok well, there was a specific reason why I didn't use either success or failure in my statement. Rather, I just use potential which is vague, it’s in the middle. Potential could lead to success but it could also lead to failure. As far as where I gauge myself within this piece; I was responding to Tehching Hsieh who did a piece where he did several one year performances. They were usually concentrated on doing a single task. For example; he would stay in a cage for a year or he would clock in every hour on the hour for a year. I wanted to respond to this. I could see how people could read it as a western idea of productivity: how much can you produce in X amount of time, that's what I wanted to explore or wrestle with. I am outlining what ideas of productivity there are and how does one negotiate with them. AR: Could speak more on the role of your body within this work? AC: One thing that was important for me in framing the work was that it was a performance work. Many people would consider the medium of the performance artist their body. Even outside of the art context, a body is the vehicle that we use everyday. The idea behind transforming the body or maximizing potential is addressing the notion: you are as good as the tools or the material that you work with. I am not necessarily agreeing with that idea but at least addressing it. AR: How does this process either relate to or change your relationship with your body or form? How has it impacted your relationship with your body? AC: The piece has helped me look at my body more objectively. It has helped me look at it as if it were separate from myself, as if it were a tool that I am using. I think it is challenging to displace yourself and your body, usually you identify with the body. Something that I have been observing as I have been performing this piece is that you are not necessarily what your body projects. I think that is important to realize. Although the body may not necessarily project the image of yourself that you may have in mind, it is still the medium that you are almost forced to deal with or that you have to engage with. How you choose to engage with the body reveals the amount of control you have over your own identity. AR: It has brought forth a sense of agency then? AC: Yeah, a sense of agency. That's a good way of putting it. AR: Is there anything else you'd like to close out with, about the piece or your practice? AC: What I had in mind with the piece is addressing one's own relationship with one's body. I think that's a focus that producing the work came with. I think it's, I don't want to impose, but I think it's a good thing to realize one's own relationship with one's body.
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As All Girls Do I noticed that when I got home that there was blood and that maybe the Pakistani broke my hymen. I noticed that when I got home that there was blood and that maybe her toys and thin fingers went in too deep. I thought that it didn’t break before the first time or anytime after then, before, and while shedding in the shower as all girls do with blood and old men, with dust on dark beasts, with fingers in each crease, I didn’t use a washcloth or soap because it was too late and lathering takes up so much time and the salt on my skin rinsed off better with just hot water, it burned the spots where he sweated, where she scratched and there was just so much, so much of everything and he talked too much and she went too fast, inside, and hurried but I did use a rubber as always and I prefer going slow because I can feel all of the spots. Eventually the hot water stopped up my fucks for then, stopped up the remnants of choked on thrusts and sheet stained angels softer than any snowflake or the skin of the men that pushed down to form them. I was stopped up. Salt water draining fish from my eyes that swam up from the pits of twisted numb. Is this where tears are born? The fish swam up to the back of my throat and through my eyes. How do you hold a fish that’s never been born? - Are you a whore? - What? You mean by definition? - Are you okay dear? - I have no idea. - I asked if you are sore? - Oh, no. I stopped running years ago. Low potassium they said, but I really don’t eat much, I just forget, its not like breathing. - I mean, in your vaginal area? - Oh, no. - Well, everything came back negative, except your cholesterol is high and your blood sugar is a little low. And how long has the bleeding lasted? - Almost two weeks. - Have you been experiencing any unusual feelings recently? - Feelings? - Well you know when you touch something and it’s too hot and it burns or it’s too sharp and breaks your skin and it hurts. Sometimes we burn and break on the inside. - I already told the nurse that I wasn’t experiencing any burning. - No dear, I mean are you sad or have you been feeling uneasy lately? What have you been doing? - Well a lot of things are uneasy until you realize that they are just boring and then you see that’s why because boring is never easy. I just go to the giant library downtown and buy Steve’s lunch. - Who is Steve? Is that the man who hurt you? - Steve is the man that lives in the alley next to the big library downtown that I always go to. I like their microfiche. What man hurt me? - Listen dear; if you feel as though the last person that you’ve slept with has violated you at any point, pressing charges is an option. - My vagina wasn’t violated it just won’t stop crying. - Have you tried the spontaneous releasing of serotonin? - No, I already said that I had stopped chasing birds years ago. Shock. Waves. They said from the pressure. - Well we’re going to give you specific directions on other ways in which this release can occur properly. You need to protect your gut if you want those angels to sleep. This will also help your appetite. Don’t be alarmed if the fish began to swim upstream again, sometimes they just need a place to go.
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Etymological stricture/structural (still in vogue; effaced by the now): “utopia” (Greek ou+topo = no+place) A no-place does not constitute a territory, it rejects stability the immobile center and [de]finite boundaries tied (steadfast) to a tale of concretized identity. Queer: as shifting, fluid, mutable, unbound. Utopia [no-place] in American English is defined by lie or fantasy and only under conditions the namers (speaker, dictionary, common usage) are themselves unknowingly spellbound by [lie, fantasy] constitution of immobility (read: “natural order”, define) The Real in 2013: Homogeneity, real as screen-real (reel), digitization as information mediation//factual territory effacing (replacing) lands that still shift. Current condition: subsumption of stimuli to information-formats: things are known: ways and purposes, the tactile landscape overlaid with [codes] mediation of knowing, immovable immutable. This homogeneity projects (like the screen) projects concrete. Projects immobility a (non)sens(e)ual landscape supposedly always there and now the necessary precondition for conception. Utopia (queer) then as the non-subsumption, haptic, heterogenous, undefined (unlimited). dis//functional: erasure of function a machine to an ends: no easy (clothed, coded) recognitions, no innate (romantic-sex-[eu]genetic) desires, history as production being creation being action, not the lie of passive recording. Queer, or non-centered, is then the only territory inasmuch as it is heterogeneity distinct from (production-consumption-desire—given-eat-need—fed-shit-want) the dissolution of “unique”. Communication not outside of grammar, codes (not denying their presence or structure looming) but: subversion, inversion, reversion. Non-sense resides (moves around in&out) utopia, utopia which is not [present or potential] but always a becoming.
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Why you wanna fly
Black Bird?
Why you wanna fly Black Bird? When you gonna fly? “You ain't never gonna fly.”
How you gonna fly Black Bird?
"You
ain't got no space for holding all the tears you gonna cry.”
(trigger pulled)
FLY BLACK BIRD! FLY BLACK BIRD! FLY! RISE reborn like a Phoenix in thenight! 28
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Time Exists Here, But it Does Not Scare Us is a collaborative performance about negotiating queer intimacy and survival against the pull of time. We began by engaging with ideas of queerness, intimacy, timelessness and survival, which became crystallized through our creative process. The performance evolved into a celebration of queer intimacy and love and negotiating our existence and beauty in a world that is actively trying to kill us (albeit in different ways). Queers’ relationship to time is complex, as we exist outside of hegemonic timelines of normativity that dictate rites of passage. Additionally, the realities of queerness are linked to violence- perpetuated within families, the state, the church and other institutions, that lead to a queer relationship to time. The queer relationship to time is different because the queer relationship to death is different. As a result of this, the performers create a meditative and surreal environment where the lines between dreams and reality blur and the relationship between time and timelessness becomes less and less clear. This ethereal world creation is an act of negotiating a more perfect utopian reality, a more perfect relationship to time and space that celebrates queer desire and intimacy.
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Time Exists Here, But Does Not Scare Us The piece begins with Amanda and Raena seated with crossed legs. They are in front of an illuminated sculpture comprised of exoskeletons of their breath, in the form of hundreds of assembled paper mache balloons. Two microphones extend out from the amplifier that is inside of the sculpture. The performers lock eyes and begin to breathe. The sound of their breath is amplified from the sculpture into the performance space. For the next three minutes, the only sounds present in the space are the amplification of their inhale and exhale. At the three minute mark, a quiet bell is sounds from the audience. The performers take this as their cue to begin walking in an infinity symbol in front of the sculpture. They begin at opposite ends of the infinity loop, crossing in the middle and making eye contact, but they do not touch. They walk in these loops, just barely missing one another for the next 30 seconds. Raena turns to face the audience and begins to speak. Raena: the ways in which they are trying to kill us Rapid exchange begins between Raena and Amanda. Amanda: You don’t exist. You don’t like women. Raena: God disapproves of your lifestyle. Amanda: You’re a fucking bitch. Hey bitch, come over here. You just need a good dick. Raena: What is that? Are you a boy or a girl? Amanda: You don’t need medication. You can just try harder. Raena: What are you? Are you mixed? Amanda: what the fuck is performance art? Why don’t you do something worthwhile? The performers turn to one another and place one hand on the others face, covering it. Amanda: the threatening The performers stand with their lips almost touching, but do not. This action is held. They begin to trace their hands around each others bodies, centimeters from the skin, but do not make contact. This process is repeated until both performers bodies have been traced by the other. Raena: the ways in which they imagine our bodies Amanda moves through the space, posing in classic pin-up poses that are slightly distorted, like a rag doll attempting burlesque. While she does this, a male audience member repeats: you exist for my gaze, you exist for my gaze, until Raena interrupts. Raena: forcible categories to pacify your anxiety about my ambiguity Raena walks through the audience, pointing to people of all genders and repeating she-she-she-she-she-she-she-she-sheshe-she-she-she-she. Both performers turn to face the audience again, as a pair in front of the sculpture. Amanda: the loss of consciousness Raena: the methods by which we are forgetting Amanda and Raena (alternate): the blunts, the joints, the bowls, the bottles, the pills, the tabs Amanda: the suicides. 31
Both: We miss you. The performers bridge the gap between their bodies, extending their hands to touch palms. They hold this pose for as long as emotionally necessary. The performers sit, cross-legged, facing one another. Amanda: the alienation Raena: the halting The performers begin to scrap at each other’s chests with their hands while sitting cross-legged in front of each other. They repeat this action for as long as emotionally necessary. Amanda stands. Raena bends over in front of Amanda. Amanda: the monument Raena: WHERE IS THE MONUMENT TO ALL OF THE DEAD QUEERS IN WASHINGTON D.C? Begin rapid exchange between the performers. Amanda: the memory Raena: the plunge Amanda: the urge Raena: the purge Amanda: the reverberation Raena moves towards the audience, sighs. Amanda moves towards the audience, gasps. Raena: the glimpse Amanda: the waking Raena: the vocalization Amanda: the mediation Raena: the sacred In this moment, the performers gently cradle the others’ head with both hands. Amanda: the kindred spirit Raena: the longing Amanda: The kiss. Ask the audience if they would like us to kiss. Wait until they respond. Act accordingly. Raena: the glistening Amanda: the ways in which we are beautiful Amanda sits on the floor next to the sculpture, Raena sits on her lap and pets her armpit hair. They move towards the audience, slowly and gently, as if sharing a secret. Amanda: the methods by which we are remembering Raena: the ways in which our bodies actually are 32
Amanda: the power of my femininity terrifies you. Raena: Your binaries can suck my cock! Amanda: the methods by which we have survived Begin rapid exchange between the performers Raena: the art Amanda: the orgasms! Raena: the music Amanda and Raena alternate: the blunts, the bowls, the joints, the pills, the tabs, the cigarettes Raena: the impenetrable essence of fuck you Amanda: the hair dye Raena: the chosen family Amanda: the feminist theory Raena: the gangsta rap Amanda: the worlds we have created The performers begin to walk in infinity loops again. This time, they touch when they pass. Raena: when we are enough Amanda: when we may both exist here Raena: when we are not afraid The performers return to the sculpture and breathe into it together for one minute. Slowly and gently, they re-approach the audience and motion for them to draw closer around us. Quietly and without instruction, wait until the audience and the performers have synchronized their breath. Rely only on a mutual desire for closeness and intimacy with the collective. The sound of breath is powerful and creates a meditative, intimate atmosphere in the performance space. Stop when it feels right. Say thank you.
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Here Soon Roars yet that old train to rouse this stretch of cold tracks to steely groans. Long numb this young man he waits on the rattling platform and despite the bitter wind keeps his place amid the pages. Amid the words. Whose syllables to stay awake he makes his own, mocks, by mouthing them aloud. Roars yet that old train to rouse this stretch of cold tracks to steely groans. Funny that phrases unfamiliar render this city perceptible at last. And there it goes the train which would have traced his way homeward had it stopped for him. Whom no one hears but he. Who begins to shiver.
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Cognates “Say it quick” “Green ghost” “Keep saying it” “Green ghost, green ghost, greenghost, greenghos’” He taught me maldiciones en Epsañol Salvadoreño “If someone annoys you you tell them mamamela” I attempted what I could with Spanish 1 vocab “¿Te gusta Fall Out Boy?” Our mundo was middle school Black and Latino estudiantes White Ts and cordones as hair ties B2K and Daddy Yankee MS13 tags scribbled in Sharpie on mesas I listened to emo música wore Hot Topic band Ts watched The Real World He watched The World Cup styled his Mohawk with gel liked a white girl with big chices When the Black kids isolated me as a “faggit” he embraced me with his lenguaje
He didn’t notice my afeminación “Is this piercing gay?” He squeezed his ceja
with an American accent “It’s not Gerardo it’s Gerardo,” he’d correct
I noticed his thick acento his proficiency in matemáticas his disdain for the país he’d arrived to three años prior his disdain for the lengua despite his mastery of it for white personas despite his crush
I made an effort at my own accent the trilled R stuck under my Anglophone tongue
When my madre refused to shop Office Depot in the absence of a school supply lista en Inglés I was unsure of whether her refusal to attempt to understand the list en Epsañol was racismo unsure if when I heard the rumor circling my little Northern Virginia county that illegal imigrantes were being “sent back” I feared Gerardo’s salida or enjoyed the feeling of regained privilegio I’d thought I lost caught up in the vocabulario I’d yet to understand
“Ey chico”
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“Gerardo” someone would say
“Gerardo” I’d attempt “Gerardo” I’d try again When I’d fail he’d embraced me with his language “Jutino” “Gerardo” “¿Que onda?” Soon we’d for high school
separate
He to a new school in which the county zoned all the Latino students rumor had it I a predominately white school for their arts program Soon I’d complete AP Spanish 5 my tongue still heavy but my eyes open enough to see all the greenghos’ gringhos’ gringos I once didn’t believe in I remember Gerardo Hernandez.