There Are Certain Facts That Cannot Be Disputed - Juliana Huxtable
There Are Certain Facts That Cannot Be Disputed is a 2015 multimedia performance by Juliana Huxtable that combines video, photography, sound, dance, and costumes, to both interrogate and queer the way race, gender, and digital media/culture intertwine. Staged at the Museum of Modern Art, the final act, AVATARS, explicitly wrestles with the way that our identities and sense of history are both warped and heightened by virtual enactments and the fervent fandoms that swirl around video games. Of particular interest to VGxA audiences is how the AVATARS act serves as something of a capstone for her earlier photography, performance, and text works (an example of which is above) in which Huxtable cosplayed, mutated, and commented on tropes of women characters in the hyper-machismo of fighting games, i.e. Street Fighter and Tekken, often with an eye toward trans and black intersectional frameworks. Demonstrating both a nuanced insider’s understanding of the way media-derived identities are reused and re-performed in culture, combined with a critically queered outsider’s perspective, Huxtable draws connecting lines through otherwise balkanized understandings of art and media and society, charting new pathways for the future of art.
Artist: Juliana Huxtable
Huxtable’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/julianahuxtable
Connections:
Yasumasa Morimura - “Self-Portrait (Actress)/White Marilyn”
Mariko Mori - “Play With Me”