Bubblegum Club

Tag: diversity

  • Discwoman South African Tour: Technofeminism, UMFANG + SHYBOI

    Discwoman South African Tour: Technofeminism, UMFANG + SHYBOI

    Championing diversity in the electro music industry, the femme-focused Not Sorry Club awards special dedication to building a more inclusive rave community by bringing UMFANG and SHYBOI, two of Discwoman’s finest artists, to South African shores for events in both Cape Town and Joburg towards the end of September.

    Founded by Frankie Decaiza Hutchinson,Emma Burgess-Olson aka UMFANG, and Christine McCharen-Tran, Discwoman was initially conceptualized as a two-day festival in Brooklyn with an all-woman line-up back in 2014. The New York-based collective has since expanded into a booking agency and platform that showcases the wealth of female-identifying DJ talent on the rave and hybrid club music scene. They have gone on to produce and curate events in 15+ cities globally — packing heat with over 250 DJs and producers to-date.

    Discwoman co-founder UMFANG holds a monthly residency called Technofeminism at Bossa Nova Civic Club focusing on emerging talent. Her sets serve up a pulse-electrifying cocktail of icy techno and abstract rave through amorphous polyrhythmic productions, playing with people’s expectations of how a techno set can be defined. UMFANG’s is on a mission to evoke something inside of you in her most recent offering, Symbolic Use of Light, which boasts a sound that leans more on the harder side of techno and was released on Ninja Tune’s Technicolour imprint.

    Known for causing sonic disruption from a creative position between Caribbean and American culture, multidisciplinary artist SHYBOI uses sound to interrogate ideas of identity, power, and history. She is a former member of the queer artist collective #KUNQ whose ethos is centred on the production of multidimensional work through sound, visual and performance art while expanding the discourse surrounding the subcultures and genres that have become diluted or obscured in the name of hybridity. In addition to this, SHYBOI has three Boiler Room sets under her ever-widening belt.

    As the collective’s ethos goes: “Amplify each other”, in consonance with Discwoman’s endeavour to highlight female and non-binary artists through their Technofeminism movement, workshops will be hosted in each city in collaboration with shesaid.so South Africa and will include interactive couch sessions as well as inclusive cognitive enlightenment.

    Keep your eyes on Not Sorry Club’s social pages for the local line-up announcement and more details on the event.

  • Buhle Ngaba – the impact of storytelling

    Buhle Ngaba – the impact of storytelling

    Cogito, ergo sum. A Latin philosophical proposition put forward by Decartes in the 1600s, roughly translating to mean “I think therefore I am”. The work of Buhle Ngaba unintentionally speaks to this proposition, and combines it with her passion for literature and storytelling. This transforms into a statement – I write therefore I am. I speak therefore I am. As an author and actress, words as text or as animated sound are her chosen medium to share her story and impact the narrative of past and current herstory.

    Encouraging people, particularly young women and girls of colour to tell their own stories is one of the motivations for her work. In light of this Buhle wrote the children’s book The Girl Without A Sound. Bringing diversity to the children’s book landscape, this book was born as a response to reflecting on the fairytales young girls are told. Stories with protagonists being blue-eyed princesses with long golden locks, and narratives emphasizing physical beauty. Writing and publishing her book was a way of undoing this framework for fairytales, and putting together words and images that heal, empower and entertain. The story is of a voiceless girl of colour in search of a sound that she can claim as her own. This channels the energy that permeates her practice as a whole – giving power to devices to draw strength from for women of colour in a world that rejects, shames and pushes them down.

    Parallel to her work as a writer and a performer, Buhle is the director of KaMatla, an NPO created to assist and offer guidance in the development of arts in underprivileged communities, and to foster habits of personal and communal storytelling among young people.

    Over the years she has received well deserved recognition for her creative endeavours, including being awarded the Gauteng Youth Premiers award for excellence. She also received two Kanna Theatre Awards for her first play ‘The Swan Song’ which was created during her time at The Royal Shakespeare Company.

    To find some encouragement this women’s month and to keep up with Buhle’s work, follow her on Instagram.

  • Amarachi Nwosu – Dismantling Stereotypes and Blurring Racial Lines with Cinema and Photography

    Amarachi Nwosu – Dismantling Stereotypes and Blurring Racial Lines with Cinema and Photography

    Amarachi Nwosu is a Nigerian-American artist currently based in Japan. She creates works within a multitude of mediums which include video, photography and text. With her lens, a visual exploration of contemporary African identity and diversity takes place acting as both a representation and celebration of Blackness. “…If women of colour are not behind the lens then we are less likely to see women of colour cast in front of the lens and only through representation can we truly shape change in the spaces that need it so much.”

    Amarachi creates her work in various locations around the world. Her acute awareness of different energies and cultural representations within different regions of the world has led her to make creative choices in her shooting process that highlight the unique qualities of a specific region. Such decisions are discernible through her choice of colours, location, models and even the team she chooses to work with on a project. The artist believes that this approach to her projects results in a visual representation that possesses several dimensions.

    Traversing between art, fashion and documentary photography a human connection between herself and the people she photographs is imperative to her practice. This connection is cherished by the artist as she believes that in photographing people, she is telling their story as much as she is telling her own.

    With an already established name and client list, Amarachi has created work for adidas Tokyo, Vice Japan, Highsnobiety and her most recent show-stopping credit, Black in Tokyo. Black in Tokyo is a short documentary by Amarachi depicting the experiences of five people of colour who have moved to Japan from Eritrea, the United States and Ghana.

    The film explores the challenges of being black in Tokyo while simultaneously taking a closer look at the experiential opportunities that have helped expats of colour build successful businesses, careers and relationships. The documentary forms a part of Melanin Unscripted, a platform Amarachi created to blur racial lines and dismantle stereotypes by revealing complex cultures and identities from around the world.

    Her practice inhibited within the space of fashion takes on a multifaceted approach where Amarachi frequently takes on up to three behind the scenes roles in one project. She often acts as the photographer, creative director and stylist on a shoot, considering every detail of a project instead of just purely focusing on composition.

    Amarachi is a multifaceted creative expressing the lived experiences of contemporary Africans all over the world through her lens. Her work aids in blurring racial lines and dismantling stereotypes through exposing complex identities and cultures all over the world. Amarachi’s work is then a visual manifesto that indicates to her viewer that African identity is not linear or one-sided, and that narratives surrounding Blackness are complex and diverse.

    Watch Black in Tokyo below:

  • Phile a platform – challenging assumptions about normative sexual desires

    Phile a platform – challenging assumptions about normative sexual desires

    In a world of accessibility, erotica of every nature can be found with a keyword search on the internet. Sexual subcultures cannot be simplified and understood in categorical terms as there are endless multiplicities. It is also true that many of them may be yet unheard of. In the decade that we find ourselves in there is more acceptance of different ways of being in the world. More freedom to express and celebrate one’s sexuality, fetishes and inner desires openly. What does this say about us as a human race and what does it say about our innate desires that are explored in a variety of media from various publishing platforms, to academia to documentary work and erotica?

    One such form of media dedicated to celebrating sexual diversity from around the world is Phile. In the pages of this erotic platform, you can expect to find drag icons, phallic sculptures and buttholes. This journal investigates sexual subcultures, communities and trends. Platforms such as Phile, act as a reflection on sexuality and the complex nature of human desire, thereby breaking down one-dimensional perspectives.

    The founders of the project, Erin Reznick and Mike Feswick, express that it has enabled them to see the connections between larger socio-political, cultural and economic trends. What they find the most intriguing about Phile is unpacking the way in which people reveal their desires. They then attempt to understand the human sociology behind it.

    What differentiates Phile in comparison to the vast amount of other disruptive sex platforms such as Working It (a platform where sex workers can discuss their industry openly), is that it invites contributors to write about their personal experiences. The founders of the journal believe that this method avoids sensationalist reporting and aids in creating more significant and authentic narratives.

    “We don’t aim to shock people with the issues or fetishes that we publish. We simply want to present our readers with information on what exists in the world and encourage insight, exploration and acceptance,” Erin and Mike state in an interview with Husk magazine.

    The provocative spread of their second issue features a photographic series on fetish fans in Michigan, sculptures of handmade prison sex toys called ‘fifis’, an essay that investigates the sexual history of cannibalism in the western world as well as modern art and interviews pertaining to sexuality, fetish and sexual subcultures. The diversity of their latest issue acts as a testament to the diverse nature of human sexuality. It might be conceded that some of these sexual practices are taboo, but in a time of omorashi and adult babies are people truly still shocked by sexual subcultures?

    Phile operates between Toronto, NYC and Berlin (cities with rich sexual and queer histories). Mike and Erin research stories from all over the world to guarantee that all contributors are of varying ethnicities, genders and sexual identities, thereby preventing a domination of white western sexuality and experiences, and enabling a diversity of voices.

    Phile then acts as an access point into explorations of sexual freedom for its readers. Mike and Erin’s aspirations for their project is that it will act as a tool for their audience to explore and celebrate their sexuality and sexual preferences in a fun and playful manner. Phile is also educational in that it shows its reader which sexual subcultures already exist. Creating a platform for this discourse and normalizing human desire is what makes Phile and other platforms of this nature important. Sexuality and sexual preference are there to be celebrated.

  • WE ARE ONE Music Festival // connecting people through music

    WE ARE ONE Music Festival // connecting people through music

    WE ARE ONE Music Festival is framed as an experience of “heritage, music and inevitably oneness”. Founders Tokoloho Booysen and Tshepang Mabizela explain that basing the festival on this idea came through reflecting on the fact that there are so many barriers in Johannesburg that divide people. Their intention was to create a platform that will allow people to engage with one another through music and other cultural experiences. “…the only way for us to [be] progressive and create the future we want is to band together, we need to develop a strong sense of community and we believe that comes by unity through diversity,” Tokoloho explains. He goes on to say that, “We [the festival] use music as a connecter because regardless of who you are, the music you like makes you feel a certain emotion and those emotions transcend genre.”

    WE ARE ONE also intends to provide a space where emerging artists can share the stage with well-known musicians. “We represent a bubbling underground, so this festival needs to showcase an unknown industry made of blood, sweat and tears,” Tshepang explains. By doing this they are hoping to contribute to the expansion of the South African music industry and introduce audiences to new faces and new sounds. With the aim of giving artists the recognition they deserve, the festival presents opportunities for future headliners and shifts in the music scene while still appreciating artists who have been in the game for a while. Artists included in the lineup are FAKA, DJ Doowap, Gyre, Langa Mavuso, Nonku Phiri and Rhea Blek, just to name a few.

    Outside of the music, there will also be food stalls, clothing stalls and a pop-up photographic exhibition to give attendees a well-rounded cultural experience. “We resonate with music but we know that music is not the only impactful art form, so fashion, visual artistry and food are art forms that can also help progressively push the artistic culture forward,” Tshepang states.

    WE ARE ONE will be taking place at 1 Fox on 31 March 2018. To find out more about who will be performing and how to buy tickets visit their Facebook page.

  • Queering the Algorithm // Conversational AI Agents for the Advancement of New Eroticisms

    “Manifesto

    Queer AI advocates for:
    The queering of communication technologies.
    The queering of machine learning algorithms.
    The careful and collaborative curation of training material by and for a diversity of sensibilities and actors.
    The cumming undone of logics and sense making.
    The slipperiness of language.
    The accidental poetry of nonsensical miscommunication er(r)o(r)s.
    Fluid autonomous playful uncompromising disobedient bots.
    Messy fleshy curious humans.
    User intent mismatches as erotic deviations.
    Existential pause.
    Deep learning for deep orgasms.”

    Queer AI is an impartial network educated in queer and feminist theory, erotic literature and the ethics of embodiment. This project is framed within the larger context of QueerTech.io – a platform in the queer digital realm fostering the artworks of queer identifying artists from around the world showcasing url and irl exhibitions.

    Queer AI is the work of Emily Martinez and Ben Lerchin. Its initial execution takes on the function of a seditious chatbot negating the mimicry of gendered scripts available for obedient fembots and unruly cyborgs.

    Queer AI dreams of a future where there are a multitude of queer bots created to fulfil many needs and desires, by means of careful and collaborative curated training content by and for sensibilities and agents of diversity.

    Ben is an activist, artist and technologist from Oakland, CA making use of experimental robotics, photographies and language. This experimental practice imposes speculative interventions and reveals novel political imaginaries. The contextualization of digital conversations, reconfiguring of landscapes and the queering of algorithms are proposed as personified data. Regarding vision as a mode of data processing, they attempt to answer, “What does it mean to see like a machine?”

    Image from the Queer AI project

    Emily is a designer, digital strategist and new media artist from Los Angeles. The interest of her practice lies in digital labour, economic justice, emancipatory catastrophism and post-representational forms of subjectivity.

    The Queer AI project asks for collaborators to assist in the curation of training material for their bots. If this sounds like something that you would be interested in, simply click the ‘YES, LET’S QUEER ALL OF THE THINGS!’ button towards the end of the project page on QueerTech.io.

    A  Dis/Re-claimer policy on the project page states “Queer AI is not interested in adding to the mega corpus of straight white dudes training neural nets with boring fembot fantasy tropes for the lonely machine love future full of rapey robot sex.”

    Queer AI is a stimulating project that falls under the experimental practice which QueerTech.io proudly supports. Queer AI is the first queer network of chatbots designed for and trained by a “diversity of sensibilities and actors” making it that much more valuable for the queer community, with no training by white straight dudes. The fact that the AI’s first form is that of a seductive chatbot that negates gendered scripts for fembots and cyborgs can be regarded as a political statement against the cis-gendered nature of the world and as an act of reclaiming queer sexuality on and offline.

    Another factor highlighting this project as political in its quest against heteronormativity is the inclusion of a quote by the famous queer computer scientist Alan Turing who cracked Enigma during World War II and later committed suicide due to inhumane treatment because of his “gay aversion”. Alan states “Machines take me by surprise with great frequency.” Queer AI seeks to create erotica for a queer audience by a queer audience and promotes diversity and different ways of identifying. Strong, united, you can sign up to interact with the AI now and like me and other queer identifying bodies push for a irl and cyberspace world of more diversity and equality, including the complete toss of rape and pedophile culture that a lot of cis-gendered erotica endorses – think of Lolita, Eyes Wide Shut and even Woody Allen if you must. Let’s all advocate for the queering of communication technologies and the queering of machine learning algorithms. And remember, “The Future is Queer”.

  • The Diverse Girl Culture Author // Ronan McKenzie

    The Diverse Girl Culture Author // Ronan McKenzie

    Ronan McKenzie is a young photographer based in London. Her time at university lasted only a few weeks after which she fell into styling and reached her end destination with an eye glued to her camera viewfinder.

    The young enigmatic image maker has engraved her name on the slab of a cut-throat industry earing her merits with her diverse and authentic casting together with her individualized intimate portraiture. Taking on jobs from Wonderland, Vogue, American Apparel and SHOWStudio, it seems as though nothing can get in the way of this self-made photographer. More show stoppers that can be linked to her prowess is her debut exhibition ‘A Black Body’ held in 2015 at Doomed Gallery as well as the release of her own publication HARD EARS. The publication was released earlier this year and contains 300 pages featuring established and new on the block contributors alike. Featuring artists such as Nick Knight and Ruth Ossai this is only a fraction of what HARD EARS has in store.

    When she’s not off shooting beauty images for i-D, Ronan continues her work on a personal series ‘Girls’ that goes back to the very beginning of her photographic practice. “Girls are the first people I shot when I started taking photos. It was my friends getting dragged into it or my Mum never being able to escape a photo. I guess at the beginning it was natural for me to shoot girls, I had clothes to dress them up in and for some reason thought that they’d be easier to connect with. Now, two years on and less gender biased, I’m still so interested in shooting girls because as a young woman myself, there is an instinctive connection that I have to other women and I find it a powerful thing to be able to document them in my own way,” Ronan expresses in an interview earlier this year with It’s Nice That.

    As a photographer who is predominantly drawn to photographing and working with womxn myself, I agree with Ronan that there is an instinctive connection between femmes and that the work that is drawn from this connection is not only captivating but it’s a feeling that can only transpire from working within this narrative. Her series brings to light an invisible thread of trust that is established between herself and her sitters. Its emotion can only be described as deep sitting. Honesty and true reflection of her subjects is what Ronan values most. Her series, consisting of many photographs and many models speak of diversity and act as a study of Girl Culture today.

    Authenticity. Naturalness. These are the basic fundamentals to understanding the lens of Ronan McKenzie. The young photographer has set herself a part with her emotive, intimate portraits based on what is really there – based on reality. Her portraiture though stylized still falls under the wing of documentary photography as she captures the lives and likenesses of girls around her. One can only hope that Ronan’s ‘Girls’ will act as a more authentic voice of a generation that that of Lena Dunham’s ‘Girls’proclaims itself to be. Unfortunately, not ringing true to her own hopes, Lena’s ‘Girls’ was merely a depiction of the lives of white womxn and devoid of diversity. Therefore it cannot act as the voice of a generation.