OpenPROCESS #8: Special Tears

7 September 2016

Auto Italia
Wed 7 Sep, 6pm - late
Free, please RSVP here

Special Tears presents CRY BABY: Get Close

(。•́︿•̀。)
Stressing

(╯︵╰,)
Obsessing

。゚( ゚இ‸இ゚)゚。
Doing Too Much

 

( ᵒ̴̶̷̥́ _ᵒ̴̶̷̣̥̀ )
(I’m trying not to really think about it,
which means all I’ve been doing is think about it.)

Special Tears invites you to an evening of
~slow jams~ 

We would like to share with you some notes on desperation, on-closeness and on trying not to really think about it, which means that all we really do is think about it (Stressing, Obsessing and Doing Too Much).

Speak out soft

Sadness slows us, standing almost completely still so that we can think things difficult to think at a faster pace. Stand still for too long and we risk going nowhere; but smooth grooves lull us into a smooth sway, until we’re whining and rocking, locked steady. Close.

Come a bit closer

There is space in this closeness ‘at a slight angle’ to the everyday; stacked tight like a Brandy vocal, a proximity that is multi-tracked and multiplying, led by a single black femme voice. From this slight, slow angle we can get close to feeling out how contradictions and collectivities can be synthesised, we can think about how we might be together. We can think about what’s keeping us from each other; while moving towards each other through our selves.

Performance by Special Tears

 

DJ sets by:
Ann Ayoola
Ooretha
cruise_control
And more tbc

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Special Tears’ Open Process is a QUEER FEMME SPACE. We will not tolerate hate, harassment or violence. Respect femmes, divest from patriarchy, come gentle, be easy.

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Special Tears examines the trope of crying in its various iterations: as an expression of sadness and grief; as a manipulative affective tool; as a (mis-) gendered response; as a signifier of authenticity etc. Tears – as software – are wetness capable of corrupting hardware but also a moment of affective singularity that is unable to be assimilated into algorithmic processes. We look to utilise current technologies available to us – be that modifying, instrumentalizing or even destroying – to understand this intuition.

The main motivation behind the project is a desire for the rethinking of femme identities beyond biological essentialism, and an unraveling of the narrative of the weak, hysterical femme body who cries because she is at the bottom, imagining instead the possibility of crying as a way of getting to the bottom of things.

************

This event is organised in partnership with Auto Italia.

Dream Babes is a long-term project by Auto Italia in collaboration with Victoria Sin featuring artists using speculative fiction as a productive medium for intersectional queer experience, bringing together practitioners working across varied mediums to enact worlds that we are for, with others. This project is comprised of many iterations, public moments and opportunities to come together.

 

Further reading:
Hannah Black Full Moon
Special Tears Notes from before 

Read the interview with Special Tears here