the grafters
THE GRAFTERS is a transdisciplinary performance research project led by Wesleigh Gates, in collaboration with a flexible, transfem-centered ensemble of Los Angeles-based artists.
In both surgery and horticulture, “grafting” describes a process in which new growth becomes possible through acts of cutting and recombining. THE GRAFTERS approaches gender transition — particularly acts of surgical or hormonal intervention — as just such a generative process. Disavowing the various discourses that claim authority over trans bodies as objects of knowledge, THE GRAFTERS highlights transition as an adaptive capacity that bodies themselves already possess, and makes space for transfeminine people to claim the full dimensionality of our corporeal experience.
Project participants have included Sasha Forests, Patty Gone, B Gosse, Vaughan Larsen, Emily Lucid, Elaina Marino, Joey Navarrete-Medina, Page Person, Pau Pescador, Kevin Ramser, Quei Tann, Tuesday Thomas, Trussie, and Josie Wreck.
THE GRAFTERS has been supported by Los Angeles Performance Practice and NOR RESEARCH STUDIO.
