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You're listening to transm on 4zzz, amplifying the trans and gender non conforming voices of Brisbane and beyond. Hello, beautiful people. You are listening to Transmission on 4ZZZ. I am Hazel and my pronouns are she, her, and I'm very excited to be talking to you all this morning. And in here with me today is also ez, he, him. What's up? Hi, ez, how you doing?

I'm good. How you doing, Hazy?

I'm doing fantastic. And I've been having a really nice time lately. I've, you know, seen the doctor recently, had some changeups of my prescription and whilst I was out there in the city doing this, I was in Fortitude Valley. My partner, beautiful partner, decided that we should have a walk around, see if we can find anything nice. And we stumbled on an art exhibit. And so I thought, dear listener, that we would come to you today talking about some trans art, talking about, you know, the way that we can represent ourselves through art, see ourselves in art and. Yeah, I just. I'd love to talk about art with you, ez. You've taken in any art.

I do. I consume much art.

Yeah.

Yes. It's healing. Right. And it's part of the. I think the trans experience is that we spend time with art because it helps us understand and conceptualise ourselves as well.

Definitely. And as like, you know, more alternative communities off to the side a little bit. Art's a great way to sort of project ourselves out there into the culture and into the eyes of people who wouldn't have had much of a chance to see us or understand us.

Yeah, it's like a. We're bridging gaps between. Of understanding between trans experience and non trans experiences.

Absolutely. But if you're wandering through this big concrete city thinking about how to deal with your life, you might want to travel over to the Institute of Modern Art in Fortitude Valley, which is where I saw a great exhibit called you'd're Here Too. And it was in this exhibit that I saw some beautiful work, a lot of paintings, a lot of physical art, some film work as well, and some screenings of older film works as well. So it covers a huge span, a lot of different types of art. And I was particularly interested in this work by an artist Called Nick Breeden, who is an artist and also co host of the Proprac podcast and he's based in Woi, Sydney. And it was a lot of sculptures and it was a lot of sculptures dealing with the idea of transness, dealing with the idea of Internet culture, of sort of alienation under capitalism kind of stuff. And I. I was just really taken. It's sculpture work. It's very beautifully done and I'd just love to share some of that and talk to you about that. Where have you been seeing your art?

Well, aside from the mirror. No, can't. I don't know. I feel like I'm a sculpture, you know, trans people sculpting their own bodies, how they like it. But no, I'm not the art that I'm referring to.

No, we love it. It's confidence. You have to bring confidence.

Yeah. No, you do. When you spend the amount of money trans people do.

Yeah, that's true.

No, the art that I actually saw recently, I went to Queer Fest at UQ last Wednesday in the Great Court, which was absolutely amazing. And there was a lot of so many little stalls and art stalls. Lots of young queer and trans folk selling their wares. Usually things like little knickknacks or bugs or zines, badges and pins. So many very cliche queer merch, really. And there's a couple artists that really took. That I was really taken with. I was there on behalf of open doors. And so our stall was conveniently located right next to Gayskate. And Gayskate have a new T shirt out called Skating on Sacred Land. And it's like a roller rink.

Okay.

And it's like, it's a oblong. I don't know. What's that shape? That's like a squished circle.

I couldn't tell you what that shape is.

A roller rink.

Yeah.

And it's got beautiful indigenous design through the whole space of the rink around it. And there's also like pays a little homage to the roller derby scene as well. And it's just this really beautiful intricate art. It's got a snake and the progress flag. Also sort of like beautiful. And it was really beautiful. So I picked me up one of them.

Yeah, that sounds amazing. I'm have to try and see if I can track down a place to pick up those as well.

I think you can pre order them on the Gaysgate website. Like head to their Instagram, stuff like that. Gatesgate.

Excellent. That's fantastic.

So that's one thing that I saw that was pretty cool. But there are other things as well which we can get into.

Absolutely. I recently, as I said earlier, saw a exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art in Fortitude Valley. I came across the wonderful art of Nick Breeden and I wanted to talk about a specific work I saw there. So there's something called Whoa, I'm kinda hyper, which is referencing a popular online meme. And I'll describe it for you visually as we're in an.

Okay. Take me on a journey, Hazel.

You enter this room. There's a variety of objects throughout the room, all beautiful art, but this one that took my attention appears to be a. A sort of ray gun built out of white Ultra Monster Energy cans.

Okay. Actual ray gun. Not the dancing. Yep. Yeah.

No relation to Australian breakdancing.

Okay, great.

Or Australian, whatever that is. And it's got. It's sort of been welded together in the shape of a ray gun and has the sort of trans colours, sort of anodized painted onto it. And first of all, I just like it as a piece of art. It's just visually really cool to look at. But secondly, it's kind of making some statements, Right. You know, it's featuring a popular meme about trans people kind of being transed by White Monster Energy, which picked up a lot in niche sections of the Internet. But it's also kind of bringing up the idea, this allegation that the trans community are a militia, that we're a violent force that are like incorporating people into our kind. So I like that it's poking fun at all that. And it's doing so with kind of a light hearted arts and crafty kind of looks. But here's the thing that really took me away about this artwork, right? It is not made of cans. It is perfectly handcrafted aluminium piping that has been machined into the shape of cans, glued together. Whoa. And then custom etched with all the monster artwork on it as well. It is crazy because I was, see, I was in there, I was peering at it as close as my face could legally get to it, and I was dead certain they were cans until I looked at Nick Breedon's Instagram and I saw videos of it being machined and milled and it's exceptional.

That's really cool. What, what dedication to refining and creating something from scratch like that.

Right.

I think that's really cool.

Yeah. So I've really enjoyed that. I've really enjoyed sort of the way it's connecting with Internet culture and popular culture. It also made me think back to. I don't know if you remember the Impossible Whopper?

Oh, my gosh.

Yeah, yeah.

Wow.

Had like an insane amount of oestrogen content or whatever, which obviously does nothing to you when you're eating a burger. But the implic that it was turning a bunch of men into women.

Yeah, yeah.

Very, very fun to me.

That's how it happens.

But also on the website for Nick Breedon, there was an essay written by Tara Heffernan called Public Art. And I found that it was a very, very interesting sort of deconstruction of what public art means for us as queer people. Because for a public artwork to be put together, it sort of requires a communal effort, an agreement of local government, an agreement maybe of corporate sponsors. And she brought up the idea of Tinder's the Big Rainbow. Do you know about Tinder's the Big Rainbow?

No. Tell me more.

So Tinder, out in rural Australia, erected a giant big rainbow, sort of riffing off the idea of, you know, like the Big Apple, the big pineapple and so on and so forth.

Is this Tinder like the app?

Tinder like the app.

Okay, yeah, yeah.

And I thought she had an interesting quote about this where she was talking about how that idea of the rainbow is kind of like a corporate symbol now. She was saying that it's got an omnipresence, that it seems to eclipse the real world reverence of it. It can be homogenised easily into corporate art, into marketing and everything like that.

Yeah, totally.

And I thought that was interesting. Do you have any sort of opinions around that kind of thing?

Oh, yeah. I mean, I don't know, now that you're bringing it up, actually, I don't know how much I've thought about this consciously, but it is definitely an unconscious thought. When I see a rainbow on an item of clothing in a shopping centre or out, or I see a rainbow on a business, my immediate gaydar or filter will go, is that a corporate gay or is that a queer queer gay?

Because there's a distinction, isn't there?

There's definitely a difference.

Yeah.

And you can feel it. You can feel the difference.

I think it's also. It's contextual, right? Because in Australia, we tend to be, compared to a lot of other Western countries, a tad more progressive when it comes to accepting of gay people and of queer culture as a thing. Compared to, you know, we look at the US right now, there's a pretty significant backslide as far as social acceptability of queer folk goes. So I would imagine the context is a little different if we were talking in the US I would probably be a lot more glad to see a gay flag on a business if I was in the U.S. but over here, you do kind of get that feeling sometimes. You'll see a gay. A little gay sticker on a door. And I wonder, like, is that there just because they have sort of a mandate to put that there, or is that there because of a genuine passion to make sure that, you know, it's a safe space for you?

Yeah, yeah. Actually, there's a really good example of this that I experienced a few years ago. We did an episode on it on transmission called Sexno. It's when we talked about sex bow and the corporate grab at the queer community using rainbows and pivoting themselves and positioning themselves marketably towards the queer community for our sweet, sweet, sweet pink dollar. I can almost guarantee you that the queers that I know have no money, but I'm glad that they put that much effort in. Yeah, well, not really that glad, but they put a lot of effort into market towards the queer scene because it's, you know, it's trendy, it makes money for sure.

Here's the way that I look at it. My personal opinion, when we look at, like, corporations and, you know, to, you know, like back to the song at the start of this capitalism in general, they're not your friends by nature of being a big company. It can't be your friend. That's how it works.

Yeah.

And so I don't think we should ever necessarily be excited at the idea of a company liking us, But I think it is a great litmus test for understanding where our sort of society is directing. If companies feel like they could make a profit out of appealing to us, I think it's a good measurement for how sort of attitudes are changing.

Yeah.

But I think we should be careful not to confuse that for genuine endorsement as a community as well.

Yes, absolutely. And that can be really hard to navigate, particularly if you're young or maybe from a more rural area and you're not used to seeing this kind of, like, marketing. Often you might be deceived into thinking something's cool and queer when in actual fact they just want your money.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

And I don't think it's impossible to feel that way about Tinder. You know, like, it's. That's certainly an app that queer people are on. But also, as far as these kinds of apps go, they don't necessarily have a great track record for supporting community and individuals. And.

No, yes. No, no. They want More users. Because data is money.

Yeah. And, you know, if there's ever a community that could use a dating app, it's the queer one, that's for sure.

Yeah, it's my TransLink app. You know what I'm talking about.

Yeah, absolutely. But, yeah, no, I'm very happy to hear your opinions about this as also a text in from Natalia. Thank you, Natalia, Nice to see you. Thank you for the Good morning. And, you know, I've been thinking about our opinions on Ponyu again recently. I need to rewatch that film. It's really nice to see, you know, when we're looking at all this fake corporate identity, fake corporate queerness, it's fun to sort of identify real queerness out of something.

Yeah.

Even if it's a little tucked away, even if it's something that, you know, isn't put there to find you. To find it is really fun.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, there are plenty of things that. Plenty of music, especially that I listen to where I'm like, oh, this is definitely not by a queer artist or particularly queer lens, but the lyrics, the tone, the vibe, it's giving me trans. And I'm really gelling with it. So sometimes, you know, you can find examples of yourself and many different things, regardless of where it stems from.

Absolutely. But secondly, ez, would you like to grab some of the interesting stuff Natalia shared with us?

Yes. In a previous episode of Transmission, we're talking about, like, media and things that kind of like, I don't know, not necessarily is trans, but yeah, we relate to and stuff like that.

Totally.

We mentioned Ponyo or Natalia texted and messaged Ponyo. Now we're talking about werewolves being femcoded Shrek, potentially also being a transcoded story, also with, you know, Fiona hiding who she is throughout that story.

For real. We've all been there. I do want to actually unpack that. What do you think about werewolves being femme? Because I don't know, Natalia, I think I might rebut you. I think it's kind of mask coded. That's what I'm getting out of it. Yeah.

Well, I'm also. I'm with you, Hazel, because I'm happy to debate this. I love debating this stuff. It's so interesting.

But maybe I'm biassed by just the general hairiness of werewolves, but I don't know, there's. I guess I don't know where I'm going with it. I'm going entirely off vibes here. But there's, you know, to me, I've Always associated. You know, there's like the binary. Right, of vampires and werewolves.

Yeah.

And I've always associated vampires with a bit of a femininity. I don't know if that's something seductive.

And sensual about them.

The preserved nature of how they do it.

They don't go outside during the day.

Yeah. So me, I don't go outside. The sun burns me.

I actually heavily relate with werewolf and lycanthropy things in particular. Liz Witt has just come into the building and smiling at this conversation. But, yeah, essentially I've always related to werewolves. I actually disliked vampires completely as a young person. I was very adamantly. I was like, no, I'm team Werewolf, not Teen Vampire.

You're watching Teen Wolf?

Little bit. And I related to it mostly because I think. I think for trans masks, there's also kind of a story or an allegory there with getting an injection and then the full moon.

Oh, wow.

And the hair bursting forth over time.

I do see that.

And, like the aggression and, like not being able to control urges and moods.

Or behaviour, suddenly more overwhelmed by powerful.

Feelings and a huge physical transformation. So, like gaining so much muscle, getting very hairy.

True. And you know, to extend on that, on the idea of associating the sort of feminine side to vampires, that's sort of like that sudden, like, empowerment, that sudden, like, identity gained, that kind of thing. I really come in with that on the topic of vampires. By the way, have you seen the movie Sinners?

No. No. Oh, my God, no.

This is my psa. I'm gonna be a missionary for the movie Sinners.

Okay.

Watch that movie. It is crazy. It is so intense. It is vampires and just a really good take. It's kind of like, got a bit of an analysis of the colonial side. Vampirism is kind of like. It's like an allegory for cultural vampirism. Like they want to take people so they can gain their culture into their hive mind so they have more music, they have more stories. And I mean, on the idea of capitalism and queerness, they're there to take that kind of rawness, that authenticity from you so they can use it to sell more. And I loved it. I thought it was just electrifying and the soundtrack is just exceptional.

Wow. The parallels between vampirism and trans femininity.

Here we are said with much love.

Definitely with much love.

I don't know. Do the folks listening have any opinions on this? Feel free to text us. We have a text line. It's 0420626, 7, 3, 3. If you have an opinion on this, I want to hear about it because, you know, I've disagreed with Natalia here. I want to hear all sides of this debate. There could be any kind of thing going on.

Oh, totally. There's so many different. Like just a couple episodes ago I was talking about the Fast the Furious franchise and how that overlapped with like, people saw parallels with the trans. Trans mask experience as well. There's lots of, there's lots of things that come up that you watch and you're like, huh, yeah, that could be trans.

I mean, at the end of the day, we are living lives. It's all, you know, there's. Our experience, as specific as it is, is also a really wide one. And all aspects of life are gonna cut into it and you're gonna see it like fragmented all over media. And that's really fun. I really need to dig into that Fast and Furious analysis. I really wanna.

Yeah, happy to lend you the zine.

Yeah, I really wanna see cars leaping from buildings and two muscular grown men grunting and yelling at each other and be like, yeah, this is my trans experience.

Also like Transformers, being able to like go from like a robot to a car or a helicopter or like, you know, being able to shape yourself to the utility needed.

For sure. There's much to think about here.

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Hello and welcome Back to transmission on 4ZZZ. My name is Hazel and I use she, her pronouns and in the studio with me today is es and I.

Use he, him, pronouns.

We've just been talking about, you know, trans art, the idea of art as a commodity that capitalism will try and take from you. Don't let it, never let it. You can't let them take it from you guys. And also, you know, just enjoying media that isn't necessarily trans, but finding the transness in it. It's been a fun discussion.

Yeah, maybe, actually, maybe we should be moving away from using the rainbow as like a signifier for whether something's queer and we should move Back to the pink triangle since the rise of fascism. That's very kind of around.

Yeah. That reclaimed symbol that. That used to be a part of the people who are oppressing us.

Yeah.

It's a firm signal. It's saying.

It's a very firm signal. It's a complete single symbol.

Freudian slip. No, it's a. It's a. It's a firm rebuking of that. Right, exactly. It's a message as well as an identifier. I like that. That's really fun.

Yeah. Maybe we should look at that. If you are not familiar with the history of the pink triangle, I will give a message to Toby in the podcast to put a link to an article on it. So if you listen to the podcast, which Transmission, we're on Spotify, Tidal, we're on the Community Radio plus app. You can also listen back on the 4Z website.

We're everywhere. It's a great way to listen to us without all that boring music, am I right?

Oh, God, it's so terrible.

That music's fantastic. Also, a quick thank you to Toby, who in general is just a fantastic podcast editor. Yes, we would be nowhere without him.

And a true example of an ally helping prop up trans voices peacefully, mindfully, in the background, helping us out.

So, a big thank you and much love. Well, I guess that's about it for today. It's been a wonderful show. I've really enjoyed talking about these topics with you as.

Yeah, me too. Loving trans art and, you know, how we interpret the world through things that already exist. That might not be for trans people specifically, but us, you know, reinventing those stories and taking a look at, you know, Internet culture and trans. Internet culture and kind of like putting a spin on that and how we can, like, conceptualise that in reality. Offline.

Absolutely. It's a lot of fun. Well, thank you for listening. This has been transmission on 4zzz. You can catch us at 9am on.

Every Tuesday and you can always listen back to transmission on the 4zzz website, 4zzzz.org au you can head to the AMRAP page. You can listen back up to. I think it's six episodes. There's also a bunch of other programming. If you don't listen to just, you know, others 4, 000 broadcasts. You totally should, but. Yeah. Thank you so much for tuning in and we'll see you all next week. Bye.

Thank you so much for listening to Transmission. See you next Tuesday, 9 to 10am on 4 Triple Z.