Finally We Are No One dares to dream of a queer utopia. The present is not enough and we must dream as a critique of the present. Emulating heteronormative and reproductive ways of living is not enough; queerness should and could be about a desire for another way of being.
To begin dreaming of said utopia, I look at ecologies of care within cis-gender, gay male communities. How does care manifest within said communities? How can we nurture ecologies of care and intimacy within? How can we love ourselves and enjoy some hard-earned, polyamorous self-love? Homosocial relationships can be paradoxical within the community as they feature communal play yet aggression. How can sensuality and sexual manifestations lead us into a self-care utopia? This work looks at cruising as a way of communing and an existing ecology with possibilities of self-care and self-compassion. I dream of a polyamory of self-care and self-love that we’ve never achieved. How can these queer ways of relating inspire a utopian wish?
I’m able to exist with myself within the same frame through the use of compositing techniques that depict a multiplicity of selves. Through the exploration of self as multiples, I’m able to expand on the notion of self-portraiture and scrutinize homosocial relationships as my body begins to become a placeholder for an “other.” I play both the roles of the depressed and the elated to dream of utopia. How can these roles help each other communally? What are the current issues in the community that need to be addressed by these two roles? We remain in solitude while in community; we dissect ourselves while using each other; thus poison ivy grows in the shadows. How can we push out of performing pre-established roles and liberate ourselves? As an initial utopian gesture, I engage in the potential of loving and caring for myself.
In Finally We Are No One all of the characters have the camera’s remote control in their hand; all characters are in control of the situation, thus their complicity in what happens. In the absence of characters, the camera’s solitary remote control not only hints to loneliness, but also to a potential; an invitation to what can be. The gesture of offering love to myself is therefore not an act of redemption that mitigates violence; it is instead a future being within the present that is both a utopian kernel and an anticipatory illumination.
Ernst Bloch and José Esteban Muñoz remind us that hope can be disappointing. But if we want to overcome obstacles, we have to take that risk. To move past political despair, we need to reignite our emotions and imagination. A queer utopia can only happen if we care for each other as a community.
