The Cinema of Gender Transgression: Trans Film

Series Site

This spring Anthology inaugurates “The Cinema of Gender Transgression: Trans Film,” an extensive, ongoing series exploring the ways in which the cinema has intersected with the experiences, struggles, and ideas within the transgender community. Organized with the participation of a variety of guest curators, it will showcase historical films that have reflected or explored the concept of gender transgression as well as the growing body of works emerging from the transgender community itself.

Transgender issues hold a more prominent place in the national conversation today than ever before, though gender transgression and the experiences of transgender individuals have always existed. This series aims both to call attention to those films that dared to question gender norms in periods when even to broach the topic was considered controversial, and to provide a platform for contemporary transgender filmmakers, artists, and curators.

This opening chapter of “The Cinema of Gender Transgression” includes screenings of pioneering works by Ulrike Ottinger, Rosa von Praunheim, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Frank Simon, and Sally Potter; contemporary work by trans filmmakers and artists such as Ester Martin Bergsmark, Clyde Petersen, Geo Wyeth, and others; and very special appearances by award-winning writer, filmmaker, trans activist, and community organizer Reina Gossett, and legendary drag icon and trans activist, Flawless Sabrina!

“The Cinema of Gender Transgression” is curated in collaboration with Joey Carducci. Throughout the series, other guest curators will contribute programs as well; this chapter features screenings selected and presented by Sarah Mendelsohn and Lissette Favorite.

This series is presented in conjunction with the International Center of Photography’s exhibition, “Perpetual Revolution: The Image and Social Change,” one section of which – curated by Carol Squiers in collaboration with Quito Ziegler – will be entitled, “The Fluidity of Gender”; the exhibition will be on display January 27-May 7, 2017.