Ginger Networked feminism
Spring 2017
MISSION
LEIGH SUGAR LAUREN BANKA
JOEY BEHRENS
Ginger maps networks of creative people. In keeping with the logic of a network, all of the contributors to this issue were referred by an editor or contributor from a previous issue. As a feminist publication, we are committed to supporting the work of self-identified women and queer/trans/gender non-conforming individuals and strive to share the experiences and distinctive voices of those who identify as such. Our goal is to produce a zine with a diverse range of forms, content, and viewpoints.
• ISSUE 1 • ISSUE 2 • ISSUE 3 • ISSUE 4
KAITLIN McCARTHY
AMANDA LÓPEZKURTZ
JAN TRUMBAUER
• ISSUE 5 • ISSUE 6 • ISSUE 7 • ISSUE 8
HALA ABDULKARIM JANE SERENSKA
KASIA HALL
MICHAELA RIFE
ANNIK HOSMANN
MARISSA BLUESTONE
NATALIE EICHENGREEN
JACQUELINE MELECIO
GRACIE BIALECKI
COLLEEN DURKIN
LIANA IMAM
JEN COHEN
JESS WILLLA WHEATON
MARKEE SPEYER
BRITLYNN HANSENGIROD
JENNIFER WEISS
BONNIE LANE
2
JESSICA LAW
LAURA PORTWOODSTACER
ALEXIS CANTU
LEYLA TULUN
HAYLEE EBERSOLE
CARLA AVRUCH
SONYA DERMAN
REBECCA BALDWIN
KATIE VIDA
Spring 2017
JILLIAN JACOBS
WOLFGANG SCHAFFER
DELILAH JONES
RACHEL WALLACH
MARIA R. BAAB
LA JOHNSON
ISSACHAR CURBEON
KATIE FORD
TRACI CHAMBERLAIN
HARRIS BAUER
HANNAH MODE
ARIEL JACKSON
ELAINE HEALY
ALLI MALONEY
KATHARINE PERKO
RACHEL ZARETSKY
ENA ´ SELIMOVIC
LAUREN ARIAN
YI-HSIN TZENG
CAITLIN WRIGHT NANDI LOAF
MEGAN SICKLES
SOFIA PONTÉN
LAURA COOPER
HERMIONE SPRIGGS
IVY HALDEMAN
JESSE HEIDER HANNAH NELSONTEUSCH
FREDRIKA THELANDERSSON
CLAUDIA GERBRACHT
CLARE BOERSCH HANNAH RAWE ELIZABETH SULTZER
MOLLY HAGAN
JACQUELINE CANTU
COURTNEY STONE
STEPHANIE VON BEHR
ABIGAIL HENNING
LEIGH RUPLE MARTHA WILSON MIMI CHIAHEMEN
ALEX CHOWANIEC
MOLLY ADAMS
CAROLINE LARSEN
JESSICA PRUSA
JULIANA HALPERT SAM CROW
JOLENE LUPO
NATALIE GIRSBERGER
BRE WISHART
LEAH JAMES
LAURA McMULLEN MOLLY RAPP
EMILY ROSE LARSON
INDIA TREAT
SARA LAUTMAN DOROTEA MENDOZA
RACHEL BRODY
MARIA NIKOLIS EMMALINE PAYETTE
ASHLEIGH DYE
TYLER MORGAN
GINGER
TIFFANY SMITH
3
4
Spring 2017
Issue NO 8 contributors Megan Sickles .... PAGE 07 Martha Wilson .... PAGE 11 Britlynn Hansen-Girod .... PAGE 16 Hala Abdulkarim .... PAGE 19 Leyla Tulun .... PAGE 23 Emmaline Payette .... PAGE 28 Bre Wishart .... PAGE 31 Courtney Stone .... PAGE 38 Alli Maloney .... PAGE 44 Jesse Heider .... PAGE 47 Bonnie Lane .... PAGE 52
Co-founders EDITO R
Markee Speyer D E SIGN E R
Jacqueline Cantu
On the cover: Leyla Tulun, ‘Not my Presidents’ Day’ Rally in New York City, February 20, 2017.
GINGER
5
6
Spring 2017
Megan Sickles
Figure Sketch No. 1 Graphite on Moleskine, 2017
M e g a n S i c k l e s 7
Figure Sketch No. 2 Watercolor on Mixed Media Paper, 2016
8
Spring 2017
She Can’t See Graphite on Moleskine, 2017
Megan is a Brooklyn based artist, illustrator, and interior designer. She draws inspiration from nature, femininity, her travels, and her childhood in southwestern Pennsylvania. While she works in a variety of mediums, her current favorites are ink, graphite, and watercolor (in no particular order). • Instagram: @megansicklesart • megansickles.com
M e g a n S i c k l e s 9
10
Spring 2017
Martha Wilson Martha Wilson as Donald Trump: Politics and Performance Art are One and the Same
Wilson’s performance at GingerIRL on January 28, 2017 PHOTO BY ALEX CHOWANIEC
Hello America! People keep asking me how I’m going to make America great again. How I’m going to make America safe again. It’s you and me baby—we’re going to do this together.
Ma r t h a Wi l s o n
11
It’s the coming of the solid state When we’ll all be together again Just like—I can’t remember when We’ll have paradise on Earth at last
It’s the coming of the solid state Instantaneous control’s what it takes No more dropouts to spoil the view Our society will be so cute!
It’s the coming of the solid state When morality follows interest rates Making money’s a right God-given Here’s to Calvin—is it Coolidge or –ism?
I don’t care if you record me talking about grabbing women’s pussies; however, I never let photos be taken of me wearing glasses. I don’t want to look like a 4-eyed egghead LOSER. But this performance is in the artworld, which does not count. (Put on glasses) Hi! I am Martha Wilson, an artist and an art administrator dressed up like Donald J. Trump. In all my previous performances, I have endeavored to go completely into Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush and Tipper Gore’s brains, so see what it’s like in there. But I had to turn off Donald’s speech to the Republican National Convention. I am here today wearing both personae to say a few words about how I have seen the relationship of art and politics evolve during the last 50 years. In the 1960s, the Vietnam War was like a black curtain hanging behind everything. The cultural scene was one of protest, with marches, sit-ins, teach-ins, tax protests, non-violent and violent confrontations of ideas. Kent State was perhaps the nadir of this time, when the National Guard shot and killed students. People left America for Canada; I was one of those. It was a time when neither side would listen to the complaints of the other; our society was truly divided. The 1970s saw Watergate go down. This is when Richard Nixon’s dirty tricks were exposed; he had to take responsibility and was impeached. The way this happened was that Robert
12
Spring 2017
Redford, a successful actor, paid Washington Post journalists Woodward and Bernstein to research and publish what the administration was up to. In the artworld, artists of the 1970s were inventing postmodernism, becoming socially conscious, and invading the commercial gallery scene with temporary installations and video. Performance art, too, was entering the mainstream through the bar scene. There was recognition that the artworld was a white place: artists who were white were engendering dialogue through friendship with artists of color; Jenny Holzer’s friendship and collaboration with Lady Pink comes to mind. In 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected. Although as President of the Screen Actors Guild, he started out as a liberal, after he married Nancy, she persuaded him it was politically smarter to be conservative. He in turn chartered Frank Hodsoll with shutting down the National Endowment for the Arts, the agency put in place by Richard Nixon to fund the arts. In the beginning the NEA and the U.S. Information Agency were seen as a way to project America’s cultural hegemony (Abstract Expressionists had fled Europe as a result of World War II). We were better at art than anyone else, plus Abstract Expressionist art kept its mouth shut. However, when Franklin Furnace tried to send politically explicit artist book works to South America through the U.S. Information Agency, they were rejected. Later, the agency itself was killed off. Back to Frank Hodsoll: the first thing he did was kill off the NEA’s Critics Fellowships. We, the arts organizations, did not see that the goal would be to kill off artists’ fellowships as well, and later to “professionalize” the art spaces. The Culture Wars began in the late 1980s with the furor caused by Robert Mapplethorpe’s show, “The Perfect Moment,” as it traveled. Dennis Barrie, Director of the Cincinnati Center for Contemporary Art, lost his job as a result of his decision to take this show containing explicit images of S & M practice. The Culture Wars were fought over sexuality as a legitimate subject of contemporary art. After a lawsuit brought by “the NEA Four” Karen Finley, John Fleck, Holly Hughes and Tim Miller made it all the way to the Supreme Court, the arts community lost—the Court installed “community standards of decency” over artists’ First Amendment right to free expression. This brings us to the 1990s, and the notion that no tax dollars should be paid for “obscene art.” This decade is when the Internet became widely accessible and artists started looking at surveillance instead of sexuality as the locus of threat. Meanwhile, the locus of the Culture Wars changed too, from art to a more granular and local series of battles over women’s reproductive choice; “balance” of equal numbers of radical and conservative views on university faculties; free speech granted to corporations; and Super Pac money allowed to influence public thought.
Ma r t h a Wi l s o n
13
As Donald, I represent a beacon of hope for the white working class because I am so rich nobody can buy me. I represent their desire to shake up the binary political system--or just fuck things up. I let the barking dogs of racism, sexism and xenophobia run free. Meanwhile, Republican donors and party leaders are getting behind me because I WON … the nomination, and now the election. They figure, as in the case of Bush vs. Gore, they can still control the political outcome of my presidency.
(Take off glasses) Tit for tat and tat for tit Politics is made of this You give me this I’ll give you that And we’ll both smile
Publicity’s our strategy And due to public memory Which lapses so conveniently In a few years
We can raise a family No scandal’s bad enough to flee The United States is still all milk and honey Toooo meeeeee!
I will make America great again. I will make America hate again. I will make America white again. I have already made politics and performance art one and the same. Good luck!
Martha Wilson (b. 1947) is a pioneering feminist artist and gallery director, who over the past four decades created innovative photographic and video works that explore her female subjectivity through role-playing, costume transformations, and “invasions” of other people’s personae. She is the Founding Director of Franklin Furnace. • marthawilson.com • franklinfurnace.org 14
Spring 2017
Artist Name
15
Britlynn Hansen-Girod
16
Spring 2017
I started making these 3x3 inch squares to combat the anxiety I experienced when I returned to making art again after college. I would start with a giant sheet of bristol, then freeze, too afraid of messing up on such a large canvas to even make one mark. The small squares lowered the stakes and allowed me to start creating without worrying about ruining them—if I didn’t like the result, I could just toss it and start a new one. I started making these squares as an exercise to gain confidence but now I just make them because I love them and the act has become a form of meditation for me. I’ve made hundreds of these since I started in 2012—these are just a few that have survived all of the moves I’ve made while living in Chicago.
Britlynn Hansen-Girod grew up in the NW suburbs of Chicago and didn’t go to art school because she was depressed and it didn’t seem practical, so she studied Creative Writing with a focus in poetry and Gender Women & Sexuality Studies at Butler University in Indianapolis, IN. Britlynn struggled creatively after graduating college so she threw herself into building and repairing guitars in her parents’ basement. She now lives in Chicago where she still struggles creatively and still builds and repairs guitars in her apartment. • instagram & twitter: @shitlynn
Britlynn Hansen-Girod
17
18
Spring 2017
Hala Abdulkarim Banned
It is now the third week of Trump’s reign. Still in its infancy, the administration’s standout features include ongoing chaos and upending any remnants of a democratic government. The executive order Trump issued in a purported attempt to eliminate foreign terrorism, more accurately known as The Muslim Ban, has been especially difficult for me to grapple with. The order declares visa and green card holders from seven predominantly Muslim countries, none of which have posed a threat to the U.S., will hereby be banned from entering the country. As a first generation Syrian, I was alarmed to see such a discriminatory measure go into effect so quickly. A day after the order went into effect, I found myself scouring the White House website for any loopholes or amendments that might allow the safe reentry of my cousin’s wife, who recently moved to D.C. but flew to Syria last week to visit her parents. She is now separated from her husband and job indefinitely. I have heard too many stories of families and children being detained for entire days, handcuffed, while government officials treat them like violent criminals. If anyone in my family underwent this inhumane treatment, I honestly don’t think I would be able to regulate my temper. My tolerance for oppression and abject humiliation will be tested regularly the next few years, and one thing I worry about is what my breaking point will be. In addition to the evident, unethical limitations, the effects of the Muslim ban will be plentiful and disastrous to the livelihood of all Muslims and will certainly extend to non-Muslims, as well. Even though I am a native born U.S. citizen, I worry how this will affect future travels. I have been to Syria plenty of times. My memories of my parent’s homeland, culture, heritage, and people starkly contrast the image Trump and his white nationalists attempt to evoke. I worry about my parents, who have lived here since 1974 and have both been citizens for decades. Could they be detained? Handcuffed? The uncertainty alone is enough to deter us from flying anywhere. The order is rife with ambiguity that has already allowed for U.S. born citizens to be arrested. These intimidation tactics are deliberate and
Hala Abdulkarim
19
should not go overlooked, as they are inordinately restricting our freedoms and serve as a reminder that we are second class citizens. Ultimately, my greatest fear isn’t the ban itself but the gross injustices it will enable. The Muslim Ban’s role sets a precedent for the United States, and by extension the world’s, marginalization of Muslims. The intolerance of Islam espoused by the alt-right now has a firm place in government policy. I worry for my family constantly; I worry I won’t be able to protect them. I literally worry about where to hide, if we need to resort to that. That sounds so absurd, but the last two weeks have been a lesson in the fragility of equality and democracy. I will say Trump’s The Muslim Ban has also gifted me with a bold reminder of human compassion. Images of the scores of people who voluntarily flocked to airports across the nation to protect refugees, green card and visa holders, and citizens reminded me that most people are, in fact, good and loving. I feel like I have not seen a display of solidarity towards Muslims on that grand of a scale, until now, and it made me feel less hopeless, less cynical, and less alone. Moving forward in these uncertain times, I strive to acknowledge, take advantage of, and create those systems of support for anyone who needs it. ADDENDUM The whirlwind of chaos that assailed America and reached far past our borders during the immediate aftermath of Trump’s Muslim Ban has barely abated in the weeks following the rollout of the order. Considering my deeply rooted distrust in our judicial system, I was surprised when a federal appeals court ruled in order to suspend the unethical ban and I even entertained a fleeting sense of hope. Even in hope, I had my doubts about what that suspension would mean. Interspersed in all the celebratory articles applauding justice were ongoing hardships of Muslim travelers still unable to return home, stranded while traveling or visiting home: both from immigrant citizens who lived here and even those who were born here and had the unfortunate identifier of a Muslim name. And, of course there were. Traveling while Muslim has been an exercice in discrimination for over a decade. On a flight returning from Syria, my brother was held and interrogated for hours during Obama’s term, not Trump’s. My sister’s name inexplicably appears on a heightened security list that prevents her from checking in on flights early. Our luggage coincidentally undergoes random searches more often than not. This ban was a culmination of unfounded fears and prejudices that have been crystallizing for years. And the decision of the appeals court is far from the end of discrimination Muslims will continue to face traveling and trying to lead normal lives in Trump’s America. As such, there is no time to be complacent. Trump has already indicated he will fight back against the court order, and there is no way to predict how we’ll be affected, but I can guess there are fur-
20
Spring 2017
ther repercussions to face as tension grows among all minority groups in America. The night I sat down to write this, reports revealed that Trump pivoted his focus to an equally vulnerable demographic and rescinded rules that protected the rights of transgender students. Again, I was overcome with the same disgust and powerlessness. What enrages me most is how swiftly and effortlessly this man of absolute privilege and entitlement has the capacity to diminish civil rights and protections. But what enrages me more is the systems that enable him to do so. In a larger context, The Muslim Ban and the rescinding of transgender protection emanate a very similar theme. Our basic human rights and our equality are topics for debate. Equality of the minority demographics is something that can be granted under the guise of ‘progress’ then retracted when the pendulum swings the opposite way. It certainly is not inalienable. This is the reality that inextricably binds every marginalized group together. And while the future of this administration will inevitability be consumed by putting out fire after fire, it would be advantageous to fight back against archaic systems that allow for this discrimination and terror to ensue. Human rights are not negotiable. Our livelihood is not up for debate.
Hala Karim is an unwavering advocate of human rights. She values intersectional feminism, social activism, and comedy. As a middle school inclusion specialist, Hala embraces a variety of learning styles that reflect the diversity of her students. Hala is a proud Syrian American who was born in Chicago and currently resides in Los Angeles. Her favorite of the ‘Toy Story’ trilogy is ‘Toy Story 3.’ • Twitter: helloiamhala • theradicalnotion.com/hijabs-and-the-feminist-movement-can-they-get-along
Hala Abdulkarim
21
22
Spring 2017
Leyla Tulun Not My President
L e y l a Tu l u n
23
24
Spring 2017
L e y l a Tu l u n
25
Leyla Tulun, a New York native, has been photographing since 2010. She believes that how we view others is a reflection of how we view ourselves, and from there, uses her images to bridge the gap. She currently lives and works in Brooklyn but is always itching for her next moment to travel. For the time being, you can best find her on instagram @leylahere or teaching a yoga class at your local studio. 26
Spring 2017
Artist Name
27
Emmaline Payette sticked.
sticked. is a tattoo project by multidisciplinary artist Emmaline Payette. Stemming from her academic background in environmental anthropology, her work is centered on questions of ecology and often mimics this interest formally through the creation of installation and engagement based works, like sticked. This project began with Emmaline’s collection of sticks, which she gathers, preserves, and displays. Presented quite simply as sticks, they perform as both autonomous items, as elements in her landscape, and as graphic references to more formal art practices. Beyond her studio and installation practice, her work relies on direct engagement; Emmaline has been embedding her work even more directly into the broader human environment, creating stick drawings and tattooing them by hand onto humans. With sticked. humans are invited to choose a stick from a sheet of flash with original stick drawings by Emmaline. Using the stick and poke method, Emmaline then tattoos these sticks onto humans. This slow meditative process allows for the artist to connect with her participants: often discussing a shared love for the outdoors, ecologically-minded issues, and various aspects of the human experience.
28
Spring 2017
Emmaline Payette was born in 1987 in Boston, MA. She studied Painting and Drawing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, received her BA in Anthropology from Union College, and attended the Vermont Studio Center in 2013. She is the founder of ECO AGE, a collaborative project with sonic sculptor Paulapart, creating happenings that merge art, sound, and performance. Her work has been exhibited in New York, Boston, France and been featured in Hyperallergic. • emmalinepayette.com • instagram: soupaloop22 • instagram: ecoagebk • facebook: EcoAgeBK
E m m a l i n e Pa ye t t e
29
30
Spring 2017
Bre Wishart
B r e Wi s h a r t
31
32
Spring 2017
B r e Wi s h a r t
33
34
Spring 2017
B r e Wi s h a r t
35
Bre Wishart has their hands in several creative endeavors at any chosen moment, most often involving illustration, photography, music, and the construction of gender. They live in Philadelphia and commute to Brooklyn part-time. This is one of their Tumblr pages: www.herebread.tumblr.com. Instagram: (personal) @a.cig.a.day (art) @laugh.pagliacco 36
Spring 2017
Artist Name
37
Courtney Stone Blood Pattern
HOW DO WE USE OUR BLOOD TO CLEANSE? NOW IS A TIME OF MOURNING — A TIME OF BLEEDING DUELES EN MI SANGRE PERSONALITY OF A TAMPON. BLOOD SUCKER. MY CUP FILLS, THERE IS POISON IN MY BLOOD. BLOOD-LETTING: PAINTING THE SCREAM MORE THAN THE HORROR.
38
Spring 2017
May 2, 2015
Courtney Stone
39
Above: June 1, 2015 Right: July 2, 2015
40
Spring 2017
Courtney Stone
41
August 2, 2015
I was born in Wichita, Kansas, grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, studied photography (mostly) at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and earned a Bachelor of Fine Art, directly after which I moved to NYC. I’ve been living in Brooklyn for about 2.5 years, working and making art! I like cats... ;) • courtneystone.net 42
Spring 2017
Artist Name
43
Alli Maloney Black Lives Matter
Between 2013 and 2016, officers working for the Columbus Division of Police fatally shot 24 people. Twenty were black. Kwame Patrick was killed in the same summer as 23-yearold Henry Green, whose death I was investigating when I met Sasha Dotson last year. Surrounded by clergy and mourning members of the community, she stood out in an all-white custom airbrushed skirt and tank top. She was livestreaming the event and didn’t break when I asked to take her photograph. We moved away from the gazebo platform and onto the grass. She held her oversized smartphone at face-level. Do you want to get the back, too? I did, and the better of two images was born. It was September 9. Ten days later, thirteen-year-old Ty’re King would be killed. The mothers of Kwame and Henry spoke before a crowd about justice as the morning sun turned hot and called out by name the white officers who killed their sons. We cried because in Columbus, a racist police state abounds. For too long, terror has reigned.
Alli Maloney is a writer. • allimaloney.tumblr.com/latest • Twitter & Instagram: @allimaloney 44
Spring 2017
Alli Maloney
45
46
Spring 2017
Jesse Heider Layers
The series deals with the stress women feel every day having to balance all aspects of their lives. Often times, women are expected to play the role of a housekeeper, mother, career woman, and still find time for herself. All of these rolls I am familiar with and most I find myself struggling to juggle daily. My work is mostly cathartic, in that it helps me to understand that I am not alone in feeling my vulnerabilities.
This is Lilian
Jesse Heider
47
For this series, I photographed women in my age demographic because I can relate to their strong convictions and confidence, yet still carry the burden of a society that has devalued our female predecessors and now us. It is at this age that I have become hyper aware of my womanhood and the anti-femininity that our culture exudes all around me. The positioning of the women in these images is meant to put forth the notion that women comprise unique perspectives and elevations that make them powerful and compelling.
This is Audrey
48
Spring 2017
This is Krysta
Jesse Heider
49
This is Elissa
Jesse Heider lives and work in Toledo. After receiving her degree in interior design and architectural photography at Bowling Green State University, she is back in school studying New Media Design Practices at University of Toledo. • jesseheider.com 50
Spring 2017
Artist Name
51
Bonnie Lane
My Favorite Selfie, 2015 Digital Photograph
52
Spring 2017
Two Italians and a Spaniard Having put in my very best effort to achieve the difficult task of passing not one but two vastly different portions of expanding muscle right through to the other side of the alternate universe that is the secret second passageway in the back my throat (that my parents had failed to mention in the brief and too little too late one time only explanation of the “birds and the bees”), things were not going quite the way I’d fantasized about earlier in the day. I hadn’t been especially motivated to follow through with the proposition until bumping into a male friend who yelled at me, “Fuck Bonnie, if I had two hot Italian tourists that wanted to have a threesome with me, I would be running to that hotel this minute.” “Fine,” I sighed, thinking of all the tiresome effort that was inevitably to follow. “I suppose you’re right.” Having already tested most of the limits I can imagine, there isn’t much further for me to go unless we’re talking really disgusting like scat and I am already a prude when it comes to anything involving that region, much to the disappointment of my ex-boyfriend, who assured me that all of his previous girlfriends loved to peg him. There is very little that has the potential to terrify me these days; except of course the most frightening of all. Intimacy. Masochists, sadists, polyamorists, and submissives are quite possibly the dullest people I’ve ever met. And sex parties, lacking in all respect for aesthetics and with very little sex to been seen or had, function instead as social community centers for computer geeks and the kind of girls that draw anime characters in their spare time. Once you go beyond the periphery of society’s public limits, it all just becomes such a bore, too much work for too little return. The Italians had lured me in with the words of “we’ve done this many times before, we know what we’re doing and we really like it, we’ve just never had an Australian,” so I was not expecting the awkwardness that followed. Their giggles really dried up what wetness I’d been able to muster while making out with the disgustingly overeager one, as the desirably distant one was out buying booze at my demand (I mean, seriously, what kind of person doesn’t prepare champagne at the prospect of a threesome?). “Okay guys, it’s hot and all that you’re speaking Italian, but you need to tell me right now what you’re laughing at?” Still giggling as if a teenager, the hot one said, “It’s just, it’s just, funny seeing him nar-ked.” Since I’d already surrendered my Saturday night to them and traveled all the way from Brooklyn, I thought I’d best attempt to make it worth my while.
Bonnie Lane
53
But alas, it was still feeling rather rudimentary, certainly not for a lack of effort on my part. Had I wrongly assumed that Italians inherently know how to fuck? A change of pace was in order and so I laid them both down on either side of me and ever so slightly hovered my magical fingers that would have had me burned at the stake in the Salem witch trials, over their entire bodies, Reiki style. But it was only when I, still bored, politely asked, “Can one (or potentially both) of you eat my pussy?” that the so-so evening finally inspired me with a surge passion. “Oh no, we don’t do that.” “What the fuck?” I shot up off that mattress so fast I had to catch my breath. “Are you fucking kidding me?” Understanding all too well since immigrating to the US that humor can be vastly different in foreign countries, I gave them the benefit of the doubt, following up with “But for real, is this a joke?” “Well... we are doctors.” (Hold up guys, I think you’re getting a little carried away with yourselves, you’re fucking dentists and the last I heard that was a pretty different area of expertise.) They went on to enlighten me to the medical “fact” that it is much more likely to catch an STD when returning my favor than from dick sucking. Don’t ya just learn something new everyday? Standing on my throne of revoltingly patterned “modern” carpet, I looked down upon their objectively perfect curves of honey colored Italian muscle and they suddenly looked so small, two grown men that had regressed back into boys within the utterance of one horrifying sentence. The Italians whimpered pathetically for me to stay but still not backing down on their position I told them they were sexist fucking assholes and idiots and left so quickly I forgot my mother’s necklace and had to get the hotel receptionist to zip up the back of my dress. Not more than five minutes later I fell in love with Manuel at Fulton Street station at 3:30am. I hadn’t been back to that part of the island since I was married at 25 years of age at City Hall on August 29th, 2011; the day Hurricane Irene hit New York. I had awoken the next morning as a newlywed in a haze of concussion, a bloody split ear, and no recollection of the evening’s activities, suffocated by a ridiculously oversized bed with a pants-less woman sandwiched between my new husband and I.
The last text I ever received from Manuel read: imessage Today 9:30 AM Bonnie, stop contacting me. I took a decision and I am very happy with it. I don’t want to see you and would appreciate if you respect my choice 54
Spring 2017
Fingering My Tinder, 2015 Digital Photograph
Bonnie Lane
55
Ode to Abstinence. Threesome, foursome, gangbang, more Girl on girl, girl on boy, girl on boy on girl on girl Harder, slower, take me over Fetish, humiliation, beating, domination Old man, young man, prostitute, substitute Couple, single, nameless, named Liar, cheater, hooker, beater Split, hit, lick, kiss Old woman, young woman, fat man, skinny man Tall man, short man, man in the middle Standing, sitting, laying, pissing Knocked Out Submission Knocked Up Termination Orpheus, Orpheus, Orpheus Elation, regret, determination Spitting, drinking, cumming, missing Absence, presence, denial, forgettable One night, two night, three night, please stay the night
56
Spring 2017
Summer Romance, 2015 Digital Photograph
Bonnie Lane
57
The Happiest Girl in the Whole USA, 2017 Digital Photograph
58
Spring 2017
Recent Improvements, 2015 Digital Photograph
Bonnie Lane is an Australian-born artist, living and working in New York City. Through her active participation in and representation of both online and physical exchanges, she considers her current practice as an anthropological study into human sexuality. • bonnielane.net • Instagram: @bonniemaylane
Bonnie Lane
59
60
Spring 2017