Curator and Former Occidental professor Umi Hsu gave a tour of the “Hold Each Other’s Hands: Trans Mutual Aid, 1966-1996” exhibition at Oxy Arts Oct. 3. According to Director of Oxy Arts, Meldia Yesayan, Oxy Arts and One Institute partnered to present the part archival, part contemporary exhibition curated by Hsu.
The art included is from six Los-Angeles-based artists, Leslie Foster, Prima Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai, Salvador de la Torre, Xixi Edelsbrunner, Wesleigh Gates and Sammie Veeler.
“We were thrilled to partner with One Institute this season to co-present such a timely and crucial exhibition,” Yesayan said. “[The exhibit] brings together the work of so many exciting contemporary artists while also recovering and amplifying the stories of a generation.”
Hsu said they had been looking forward to this collaboration for a long time; as a transgender artist and historian, searching for archived queer media is an interest of theirs.
“I’ve been wanting to do a show like this forever, and have collected lots of trans history on my own,” Hsu said.
According to Hsu, who taught courses on arts, technology and web design at Occidental in 2011 and 2013, the college’s community has always been a compelling site of inspiration and creativity.
“I thought it would be interesting to come back to Oxy,” Hsu said. “I’ve always felt the community was this beautiful fabric — multigenerational, like-minded, progressive, intellectual and activist. All of those things, multilayered, really made sense to me.”
Frankie Fleming, manager of arts education and community programs at Oxy Arts, said the collaboration carries relevance for curious audiences of all ages.
“If we ignore our ancestors — which to me includes kin, chosen family and leaders who came before us — we lose a critical opportunity to connect deeply with ourselves, our collective power, our purpose and to conjure the futures we want to build,” Fleming said.
According to Fleming, Oxy Arts exhibits like “Hold Each Other’s Hands” aim to reach different audiences in a way that will allow them to share common ground.
“My hope is that ‘Hold Each Other’s Hands’ invites viewers to make connections to themselves and their communities,” Fleming said.
Hsu said their experience navigating their transgender identity has played a key role in their approach to nontraditional understandings of the world.
“Within my lifetime, my identity categories have shifted a few times,” Hsu said. “I’ve gone through a few waves of identity in terms of my social, political, and personal relationships to these categories.”
Hsu said moving through these various identities allowed them to better curate featured artist Salvador de la Torre’s work.
“The constant state of becoming has a volcanic nature in Salvador’s work,” Hsu said. “That nature presents a really difficult archival [research] challenge. I learned to look for what I had an intuition towards. I knew the stories were there, and had to figure out how to find them.”
According to Hsu, their goal is to introduce significant historical references to currently-ongoing dialogues within the transgender community.
“When you’re transitioning, you don’t always have the vocabulary,” Hsu said. “I look in between the cracks, I’m not only somebody who is here to suture archival gaps, but to suture intergenerational gaps as well.”
According to Hsu, representation has always been important to the new generation. Hsu said finding the proper guidance was difficult for them as a young creative.
“When I put this show together, I imagined the 20-year-old version of myself,” Hsu said. “I wondered what it would’ve looked and felt like if I had a place like this to go. You look back and realize that event you went to was formative. You realize it gave you a sense of who you were and who you wanted to be.”
Fleming said Oxy Arts is interested in speaking to Occidental students, and is continuously looking for more ways to involve undergraduates.
“Every year we have events with clubs, and have courses come visit our exhibitions to do walkthroughs,” Fleming said. “[Walkthroughs are] a really unique and fun way to meet neighbors, artists and people outside of the Oxy circle. We think of the gallery as a bridge between campus and the rest of LA.”
Hsu said their advice for young, curious and creative individuals is to appreciate their own seemingly individual experiences as components of a broader narrative.
“Know that we’ve been here, and that we’re still doing this,” Hsu said. “You are a part of this long continuum of struggle and of joy.”
Contact Shiah Versey at versey@oxy.edu
