This article is part of Hyperallergic‘s Pride Month series featuring an interview with a different transgender or non-binary emerging or mid-career artist every weekday throughout the month of June.
As anti-trans legislation threatens communities across the country, trans femme non-binary artist and curator Pau Pescador explores the safe havens trans people have created for themselves. Next week she exhibition A place to stay will open at the LGBT Center in Los Angeles. Pescador, who lives and works in LA, selected a list of nine artists and began curating the show in April. Her own work is also included in the exhibition, which explores the ways in which trans people have found refuge in the face of bigotry, from intimate personal relationships to public events; all presented works speak of individual strength and resilience.
Hyperallergic: What is the current focus of your artistic practice?
Pow Fisher: I am currently working on several items. The first is a solo exhibition at my Los Angeles gallery, Tyler Park Presents, opening this September. In this body of work I think of my own domestic space as a safe haven for myself during my own gender transition – a small place of respite and safety (both physically and emotionally) from the challenges of the larger world around me .
As part of my early research for this project, I am curating an exhibit for the Los Angeles LGBT Center as part of Trans Pride, which opens on Friday, June 16. The exhibition, entitled place to stay focuses on how trans people create spaces of safety for themselves during times of difficulty. Artists in the exhibit include Pippa Garner, Patti Gown, Paige Person, Reynaldo Rivera, Miller Robinson, Sammy Wheeler, Zoe Walsh, Ryatt Yezbik and myself.
H: In what ways—if at all—does your gender identity play a role in your experience as an artist?
While my practice has always asked questions about how the individual navigates the larger world around them, much of my post-transition work has focused on “How does my own body feel as it develops?” As with others in romantic engagements as well as being seen in public.
A few weeks ago, I performed a more recent work entitled “The Butt Wants What It Wants” (2023) at Situations Gallery in New York and Salon Silicon in Mexico City, in which I explored – with humor and pathos – the challenges I’ve struggled with sex and intimacy with others after transition and being vulnerable. During the performance, I discussed personal encounters while showing a video of myself trying to have sex with a mannequin. Both subjects were naked as I clumsily create a moment of intimacy between myself and this subject.
I’ve now completed three longer videos that look at my relationship with my own gender over the past few years. In 2022, as part of a solo exhibition for Pitzer College titled Working, I made a video in which I conducted a series of interviews with transgender individuals who work in government. My goal for the project was to focus less on specific legislative hot topics and more on gaining an understanding of what it’s like to work in transition governance systems. Were the subjects’ experiences positive or negative? How do their experiences reflect larger concerns about transgender rights in the United States at this time?
H: Which artists inspire your work today? Who are your other sources of inspiration?
I always start by thinking of those in my immediate circle who directly inspire me. The queer faces that immediately come to mind include Daniel Ingroff, David Gilbert, Amir Nikravan, Mark McKnight, and my colleagues and peers that I have known for over a decade. I’m grateful that I see their work often and we get to see each other’s work grow and develop.
H: What are your hopes for the LGBTQIA+ community right now?
I want the LGBTQIA+ community not to feel alone. First, people are trying to get through their daily lives while laws are passed that directly affect them. But also with the community as a whole – feeling marginalized and feeling that their mistreatment is for them to decide.
The laws passing through this country targeting trans and queer rights affect EVERYONE regardless of their sexuality. This is an attack on personal freedom! I hope that during this Pride month, our allies – and especially those who support these laws – will take time and think about this. We all deserve the right to feel secure in our bodies, relationships and livelihoods.