What kind of power would you like?
I would like the power to alchemize toxicity. So often as humans, as imperfect beings, we find ourselves in situations that are awkward, strained by miscommunication, unbalance, and violence, that I would like the power to balance those situations.
How would it manifest? What would enable it?
It would manifest through me having x-ray vision into the etheric bodies of all beings, seeing the holes that need to be patched, and the areas that need cleansing, and through the stimulation of my third eye, and a serpentine movement of my physical body, burst those toxic areas into stars, giving all beings a clean slate.
Who is your favourite superhero/person/public figure, contemporary or imagined?
Frida Kahlo for her resilience, humanity, rawness, colors, flowers, eroticism, pain in tandem with her passion for life. “Freda” Josephine Baker for her ability to cross boundaries, geographies, and languages, and negotiate with flamboyance and fierceness hypervisibility and invisibility- playing the fetish while also being incredibly self possessed of her own image.
Jean Michel Basquiat for his tireless commitment to creation. Yinka Shonibare for his tireless commitment towards creating beyond the constrained movement of his physical body work that, even while he may not admit to it always, reframes colonialism and toxic human experiences in really thoughtful and profound ways.
So many others- Thich Nhat Hanh, Erykah, Amma, Audre Lorde, Alexander McQueen as artist, Sun Ra, Willow Smith, FKA Twigs, the Kalakuta Queens, Martin Margiela, Rei Kawakubo, Jesus, Shamans, but I’ll stop there.
What do you admire most about Frida Kahlo and "Freda" Josephine Baker?
I admire Frida’s ability to push past the pain in an effort to truly experience her life, to stretch her boundaries to the extent that she transcended the limitations placed upon her by other people, and in some ways herself. I also admire her ability to reconcile stylistically her complex cultural background, as a woman of both Mexican and German descent, nonetheless invested in connecting with the Zapotec aesthetics indigenous to the place she had chosen to call her home. I admire her ability to just live until it was time to die, because while the latter is inevitable, the former is a choice.
I admire “Freda” Josephine Baker’s ability to not allow criticism to deter her, to take potentially disempowering stereotypes and fetishes and, in her own way, alchemize them, becoming one of the most popular and highly paid entertainers of her era, then using that access, power, and leverage to fight for justice in both France and the United States, even while experiencing incredible discrimination in both places. To create a space to love twelve children from diverse backgrounds and needs. To do all of this bilingually without the use of the internet, Rosetta Stone, a language tutor.
What do you think of when you think of them?
Life.
What would you change in Melbourne? Australia? The world?
As a newcomer to Melbourne and Australia, I comment as someone who has spent collectively less than a year in this city / country, had the privilege of looking at this country's enormous and gorgeous sky, earn its incredibly liveable minimum wage, and form friendships and creative relationships with some of the most incredible humans I have ever met, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but if I were to change anything based on my experiences here, I would change the fear of difference and eradicate from the vocabulary and expression of every person who uses it the idea of a “monoculture.” 250 years ago there were hundreds of different tribes and over 700 languages spoken pre-colonization, so the idea of there being a “monoculture” to either fight or maintain and the fact that there exists an expression like “tall poppy syndrome” I find to be heinous and eugenic. There is a difference between celebrating one’s familial and cultural roots, or joining in mass to fight for equal rights for all, and maintaining a limited view of the world that alienates, dehumanizes, and encourages nepotism. I think it is great to love oneself and one’s roots, while also embracing the fact that we are all different, even identical twins that come out of the same womb. " In the words of Ms. Lorde, "I urge each one of us here to reach down into that deep place of knowledge inside herself and touch that terror and loathing of any difference that lives there. See whose face it wears. Then the personal as the political can begin to illuminate all our choices." I have a very comfortable life here, but am also mindful of the ways fear of difference has been the spark for wars.
Are there any other issues that are important to you? Locally? Globally?
Supporting organic agriculture and sustainable and ethical manufacturing, and the elimination of inhumane work spaces, the fur trade, GMOs, and “food deserts.” Providing creative spaces for underrepresented and disenfranchised bodies and voices, and in particular people in pain who need more spaces for imagination, expression and play as basic needs are met. Reclaiming the discarded and recycling as a way of life. Making kindness, openness, and the equitable redistribution of resources a human reflex vs. an intellectual exercise. Decolonization. The dismantling of dominant culture. Encouraging the use of bodies, sartorial choices, and the daily design of our lives to inspire a greater connection to the earth, to the rest of the animal kingdom and to one another. Authentic communication. Access to clean water. LOVE!!!
Do you feel like change is possible in these areas? How?
Yes. Making better choices for those with the privilege to consume- but looking at what one already has before acquiring more. Starting ethical businesses and properly and safely employing others. Using the privilege of an education to set up a foundation for others. Meditating. Drinking clean water. Sleeping. Taking care of one’s mind so that clear, healthy thoughts are more readily available. Slowing down the mind and thinking about what is really influencing the design of our lives, our choices and our relationships- are they principles of integrity in support of an interconnected, equitable world or a colonized mind. I am guilty of having to rethink my choices all of the time. Seeking knowledge, asking questions, talking to one another more. Movements are rarely- if ever, in my humble opinion- movements of one.
Do you think your ideas could change anything?
Yes I do, but I think this for most people. Anything linked to thoughtfulness and the imagination has the potency to change. And then the act- whether communicative, physical, or spiritual, then puts it in motion.
Are you comfortable speaking your mind/putting ideas into the world?
Sometimes. To be frank, when I sense (or make a judgment call on) someone’s energy, and don’t feel like they are interested in engaging me on this level of conversation either because I fear they think of me as a presumptuous ham or because I just don’t think they really give a fuck, I make offhand comments or use humor to buffer and replace the space. I am working through that intellectual dishonesty- through this project I’ve been speaking a whole lot more and with a lot more authenticity, irrespective of how I think it’s going to be received! And putting ideas into the world- well, FridaFreda is in many ways an attempt at that. (Disclaimer: Sometimes, though, I make a joke because I just like to laugh, even if I'm the only one!)
Do you consider yourself a feminist? Womanist? Why/why not? What does this mean to you?
Both. If we go back to the definition of feminist being the fight for equality for people of all genders, I am definitely this. Nonetheless, I acknowledge and wholeheartedly stand by the ways in which my experience, as a woman has been shaped by my experience as a black woman, woman of color, and a human whose gendered experience may be shaped by more ; and strictly feminist spaces may not engage always issues of intersectionality. Moreover, womanism, while definitions vary from theorist to activist, can be encapsulated for me in the following quote from Audre Lorde's genius essay "Uses of the Erotic": "When I speak of the erotic, then, I speak of it as an assertion of the lifeforce of women; of that creative energy empowered, the knowledge and use of which we are now reclaiming in our language, our history, our dancing, our loving, our work, our lives." Womanism for me taps into an ancient wisdom, a creative life force, and a way of living, that encourages creation, intersectionality, and experiential knowledge in the fight towards equality for all people of all gendered expressions. So in short, I embrace both terms, but thankfully through FridaFreda I have met feminist-identified people who are willing to go there, womanists who embrace their feminism, and people who are allies to these principles but in an attempt not overly-label their worlds, may not claim the name for themselves. Though I must say, thank God for Roxane Gay writing "Bad Feminist"- because sometimes my embrace of these titles ain’t always perfect nor contradiction-free.
How often do you subconsciously/consciously think about your desired superpower when you dress on a daily basis?
All the time. I wear a lot of headwraps, partially because I am still self-conscious of the post- big chop, pre- afro, awkward length phase of my hair, but also because I feel like one’s crowns is a sacred space where I am reminded to engage bodies beyond my physical one. I also wear a lot of loose oversized garments, which allow for movement, where I feel like if confronted with an uncomfortable situation, I can move and change and transform the situation in some way. Otherwise, sometimes I wear tight clothes just to feel my presence, to keep my present, to keep my focused on the situation in front of me- sometimes lycra feels a bit like acupuncture, it hits the pressure points.
