Theory of Queer Identities: Representation in Contemporary East-European Art and Culture

Abstract

Starting from the general theory of identity, gender theory, queer theory and theory of bio/necropolitics, as theoretical platforms, in a few case studies I will analyze the Pride Parade as a form of manifestation of gender body and queer body representations in visual arts, and gender and queer body representations in mass media. My hypothesis is that the key for understanding the chosen case studies is in understanding the relation between their aesthetics, political and social interventions. This will consider political involvement, social injustice, alienation, stereotypes on which ideological manipulations are based etc., as well as the creative strategies used for moving the borders of visual art in searching for authentically-performed creative expressions and engagements. In the time we live it is necessary for the politicization of art to use queer tactics, which work as political strategies of subversion of every stable structure of power. Queer tactics, in my opinion, are weapons in disturbance of the stable social mechanisms, which every power tries to establish and perform over any ‘mass’, in order to transform it to race, gender, tribe, nation or class.