Asian American Dance Performances

a look at this month’s queer API events, beginning with FRESH MEAT.
by Jez Lee

Happy Pride Month! Every June, San Francisco celebrates it’s pride month with a slew of Queer Events and Festivals. On the top of the list is Fresh Meat Productions’ 2007 Fresh Meat Festival and Asian American Dance Performances’ Translations: dancing the intersection of race, gender, and sexuality. Let’s take a look at Fresh Meat Productions, happening Thursday June 14th through Sunday June 16th.

To begin, I asked performers of Fresh Meat Productions to elaborate a little about what it means to be an Asian American artist taking part in these queer events. Of the API performers of Sean Dorsey’s Fresh Meat Productions, only one lone soloist Ryka Aoki de la Cruz stepped to the plate. A vocal and strong individual (both on stage and off), Ryka shared a little about her experiences as an artist.

Ryka identifies as an Asian-American, Japanese-American — who, like this author, has with roots in Hawaii. She acknowledges her culture as being truly blended with her life in Los Angeles (East Side). Ryka identifies as female, and more specifically “Asian American female” and “transgender female”. She says, “sometimes the extra ID is useful, and sometimes it’s just not important.” In terms of sexual identity, she feels most at home in dykespace. (Speaking of “spaces”, you can visit Ryka’s MySpace account at myspace.com/rykaryka or her website: www.rykaryka.com)

Has being a marginalized performer been a challenge for Ryka? The answer is yes and no; on the one hand, it’s gotten her a lot of great gigs. However on the other hand, it makes it harder for her to “get into the deeper truth.” I asked Ryka if she’s had any experiences where her unique perspective has been celebrated, to which she said, ” It’s not so much a celebration—it’s that because I speak as a transwoman, and/or WOC and/or dyke and/or abuse survivor, when I perform, I have felt so much gratitude and love from people, some of whom want to share their stories with me afterward. They have seen me as speaking for their experiences, as well, and that’s really humbling.”

Like most performers, it’s easy for the audience to place a label or an expectation, and the stereotypes become much more apparent in marginalized artists. Comments from audience members who sometimes miss the point can be frustrating, to say the least.

“Where I get challenged is probably when people aren’t seeing me, but rather one of the labels they put on me. At a performance last year, someone actually thought he was complimenting my performance when he said (after I had done an emotional piece about child abuse) that ‘he really couldn’t tell I used to be a guy.’ You just want to bang someone’s head with a cabbage when you hear comments like that. :p “

My thoughts exactly.

Asian American performers have long posed the issue of trying to navigate the ways their ethnic identity is read by the audience. If an audience member holds fast to Asian stereotypes, that viewer will have a skewd perpective of the performers’ intentions. This similar situation happens for many trans-identified performers. Questions arise about were the performer’s story ends and the audience’s begins. To this, Ryka says:

“Trans is especially problematic. I mean, I really really don’t want people guessing—or even worse, if they know I’m trans, to be projecting their prejudices about transpeople on to the performance. If someone is transphobic then my trans identity will outweigh whatever I say. It can be difficult. If I show strength, will the transphobic feminist see it as male privilege? Is there any way I can prevent that? And how can I worry about that and still address the theme of my performance piece, which may have absolutely nothing to do with being trans? Ugh! Never mind! Why worry—just go do it, right?”

All in all, though, most work is intended to reach audiences on a universal level with main concepts such as survival, love, happiness, and the struggle and perseverance that puts us all on the same boat.

Fresh Meat Productions

Thurs June 14: 8pm
Friday June 15: 8pm
Sat June 16: 7pm AND 10pm

PERFORMANCES BY: Artistic Director Sean Dorsey, Colombian Soul, Taiko Ren, Na Lei Hulu I Ka Wekiu, Freeplay Dance Crew, Imani Henry, Shawna Virago, Miguel Chernus-Goldstein, Julia Serano, Ryka Aoki de la Cruz and Triple Threat Taiko.

For more information: Fresh Meat Productions

Stay tuned for more, as next week I cover the artists of Translations: dancing the intersection of race, gender, and sexuality (June 29th and 30th at CounterPULSE, SF).

About the Contributor → Jez Lee is a performance artist and from 2003-2007 was the Director of Asian American Dance Performances. Look forward to commentaries and announcements from Jez in AADP’s blog, part of Unboundspirit.org.