Look Again: Gender

This book is a polyphonic portrait of the representation of gender in art, from acclaimed playwright and artist, Travis Alabanza. Part of the Tate Britain: Look Again series of books exploring the National Collection of British Art, Alabanza offers a revelatory new perspective on the ways that art and gender have interacted through the ages, taking us into the drama that always follows gender, and the drama that always follows art.

Gender is performance. Think of the acts of drama that go hand-in-hand with our experience of gender: a man spreading his legs on a tube; a woman showing biceps in a boiler suit saying, ‘We Can Do it!’; a stiletto heel stepping on a briefcase. It seems wherever gender goes, there follows a show of what it might be trying to say. Art is also wrapped up in performance. We see a piece of art as a still of a performance in motion, a moment of drama, a snapshot, a glimpse into a spectacle – it captures a breath to be immortalised. Through a number of well known works from the national collection of art, we discover who is really putting on a show, and what they are trying to tell us.

About the author

Travis Alabanza is a writer, performer and theatre maker based in London, via Bristol. Their writing, performance and public discourse surrounding trans and Black identities has seen them noted as one of the most prominent emerging trans voices in the arts and beyond. For stage, Travis wrote and performed in their debut show Burgerz. The show won the Total Theatre Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival as well as selling out numerous venues including Southbank Centre and Traverse Theatre. It was also voted one of the 'Top Shows of The Year' by Guardian readers and is published by Oberon Books. Their play Overflow, which premiered at and live-streamed from The Bush, was met with critical acclaim, including numerous four-star reviews and over 4,000 streams worldwide. Travis’ work has also appeared on BBC Front Row, The Verb and in 2019 they hosted their first radio documentary, ‘Going to The Gay Bar’, for BBC Radio Four. Alabanza was listed in the Evening Standard as one of the 25 most influential Londoners under 25 and placed on the Dazed100 list.

• Dimensions 10.5 x 14.8 cm
• Material FSC certified paper and card
• ISBN 9781849767156
• No of pages 64