My research paper was originally about androgyny and how it seems to be deeply rooted in gender roles. I was confused, because androgyny felt to me like a dismissal of the concept of gender as a whole. I then wondered what words like femininity, masculinity, male, female and gender even mean. How do we define these terms that we treat so much like law? After underwhelming research results, as well as personal inquiry and brainstorming, I found that these definitions are often meaningless, and don’t hold true to a vast majority of the people I know. I then wondered why we as a society were so tied to these notions of gender when we don’t really understand or believe what these words mean (I know we don’t understand what they mean, because the definitions of these words are no longer true for the society in which we live). I came to the conclusion that we should dismiss the notion of gender and with it banish gender roles and labels and just let everyone be exactly who and what they are. We overcomplicated our existence by adding gender to the mix and abiding so fiercely by the rules we associated with it. We need to bring it back to basics.
As for the effects my research should have on my art, I really just want my findings to inform my art making. I want to make sure that everything I write and everything I create is carefully considered. This entire topic, for me, is about answering questions and I think that, so far, my research has served the purpose of guiding me to the right questions to ask the public in my art. There have been hiccups in terms of defining my topic and potential conceptual issues in my artwork, but it’s all part of the process.
