Kamran Behrouz: Queer/trans/nonbinary bodies in Exile

This episode is a sneak preview for next show of Fem Poem with
guest Kamran Behrouz who is a Visual Artist, born and raised
in Tehran, currently working and living in Zurich. Their PhD,
entitled ‘Cosmopolitics of the Body’, uses posthuman critical
theory as a navigational tool to examine the boundaries of bodies
and humanity’s embedded and embodied cultures. They work with
multiple medias, and combines the act of painting with animation,
installations, costumes, and (virtual)performance. Their works
deal with ‘politics of location’ in association with
Cosmopolitics. Kamran saturates the Queer Identity throughout
their art, in order to draw a cartography of belonging and
displacement. Politics of image center their visual practices,
transfigured in their theoretical works, as cultural
translations, coding and textual trafficking. Kamran’s latest
research is related to the translation of queer-feminist texts
such Sara Ahmed’s latest essay into Persian language (a language
that does not register gender), and immersive art as a form of
knowledge production/distribution.


‘Breathe’ is the name of their Motion Capture avatar
—aesthetically related to the concept of “body without
organs”—designed as part of their PhD research entitled
‘cosmopolitics of the body’. This research deals with the
performativity of queer/trans/nonbinary bodies in exile, diaspora
and refugee camps.


The performance lecture Phenomenology of the Third Body reflects
on the creation of this avatar as part of this research. It poses
several philosophical and psychoanalytical questions in relation
to the performative role of VR and MoCap avatars in
queer-feminist activism and art today.


The main part of this research deals with the notion of
Untranslatability: for instance, the lack of sufficiently precise
words to address transgender or queer people in Persian language.
In this experiment the avatar realized as a new form of
(alphabetic) coding language. It is considered as a third body
for political intervention in order to distribute and perform the
translation of those linguistic and cultural lacks which
otherwise won’t get permission to be published and expressed in
Iran. In fact, the avatar is an instrument to multiply, conceal
and protect the identity of the performer.


The perfomance lecture took place on Thursday, October 17th 2019,
at the Helmhaus in Zürich.