PLAY House: The Art of Finding Queer Pleasure in (Private & Public) FUN + PLAY

Utilizing a TRANSdisciplinary and iterative process, with a focus on collage and installation, I am investigating identity & Private spaces in relationship to the Public spaces of the Art Gallery & Internet. My thesis project, PLAY House (2021), comprises three installation works that occupy, whether physically or digitally, the same three-walled room. Holliday Home (Glitch of the Heart) (2020), MySpace.jpg (2020), and PLAY Room (2021) were all created during the Covid-19 pandemic and explore intimacy, collaboration, isolation, and self-reflection with a focus on transforming a Public space. These installations act as self-portraits that aim to invite the viewer into a Private space as a means of creating understanding and connection between the artist & the participant. As my work is autobiographical, my positionality as a Canadian Queer Disabled ‘90s Kid is key to unpacking my methodology of FUN(ny) + PLAY(sure/ful) art, terms I’ve invented for the purpose of this thesis. While both FUN + PLAY evoke child-like pleasure, FUN(ny) is one’s experience with pleasure, and is a synonym for something humorous, while PLAY(sure/ful) is the thing that activates one’s experience with pleasure and a synonym for sexuality. Ideally, FUN + PLAY activate Queer Pleasure (Pride & Joy), which decreases Queer Pain (Shame, Anxiety, and Depression). FUN + PLAY are essential to our survival, culture, learning and innovation (Koster, Huizinga, Brown). Queerness & Disability drive me to engage in FUN + PLAY and dictate my choice of a Colourful, Campy, Maximalist, DeSkilled or “BAD,” Dada, POP Art aesthetic. This hybridized aesthetic is funneled into my research on private space as self-portraiture & its relationship to the public art world (e.g. Vincent van Gogh, Robert Rauschenberg, Tracey Emin, and Erica Stocking). Through my research & practice I conclude that Queer Pleasure & FUN + PLAY are essential in how we connect to ourselves and others in an uplifting way that is generative for learning, creativity, self-love, and community building.