The month of June marks not just the beginning of yet another foggy summer in the Bay Area, but it is also the time for massive queer celebrations. The parades and marches maybe be over, but June has still got a lot to offer you queers with endless energy and a love for the arts. You have exactly 4 days to recover from your crazy Pride weekend in order to come join me and a bunch of fabulous artist, queers and sex workers at This Is What I Want 2012, is an annual live art festival about desire, intent on redefining the relationship between intimacy and performance. The festival is pretty much going all week and has a variety of performances and talks you should definitely catch. Are you a mental size queen looking to get your brain jammed with as much sexy knowledge as possible? Check out the Slow Sex Symposia, presented in collaboration with Center for Sex and Culture’s Carol Queen and Robert Lawrence and under rigorous curatorial direction by Los Angeles based London scholar and practicing performance maker Doran George, “Slow Sex” comprises two facilitated discussions about desire. Grab your ticket for Sat nights “This Is What YOU Want”, which is an experience that looks to value the individual process of stating one’s desire. Working with performer/facilitators known as “chargers”, audience members will have the opportunity to design and taste their own unique mix of alternative sexual practice and performance. I am really excited to be a part of this particular piece and a big thank you to other Crash Pad resident Sadie Lune for inviting me to be a part of it. I can guarantee you will see many Crash Paders at this one.

Here’s a little more info about it…

TIWIW 2012 FESTIVAL
This Is What I Want 2012, is an annual live art festival about desire, intent on redefining the relationship between intimacy and performance. This year, in it’s third iteration; This Is What I Want (TIWIW) festival looks at intimacy of desire through the lens of economy.Can the reformulation of desire provide a fresh lens through which to consider the economy? Desire has already been envisioned beyond conventional heterosexuality, but can capitalist economies be reformulated by the queering of
desire?
4 parts performance festival, 2 parts symposia and 1 part audience participatory experiential, TIWIW 2012 promises to break notions of desire in half, combining wants in relation to concepts of transactional value, it emerges with projects that sit squarely in the very margins between sweet transcendence and reckless confusion…just like our blessedly complicated sexualities and our so often
utterly simple wants.TIWIW performance offering was curated by a team of Los Angeles and San Francisco artists: Anna Martine Whitehead, Doran George, Jesse Hewit , Tessa Wills and Rachael Dichter

What else is going on this week you ask? Well spread your little eye holes and looky here.

QUEER REBELS OF THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE – featured in the 15th National Queer Arts Festival! Following sold-out shows in 2010 and 2011, Queer Rebels of the Harlem Renaissance returns for 3 nights full of provocative performance!

From Langston’s dreams deferred, to La Bentley’s gender bending Blues, we celebrate traditions of dissent and Queer Black legacies. Join us as we reclaim history and the urgency of our voices.

Here’s the line up:
International Blues star Earl Thomas
2012 Blues Music Awardee Sista Monica
Drag King of the Blues & Queer Rebels Artistic Director, TuffNStuff
Queer Black Mobile Homecoming co-founder, Alexis Pauline Gumbs
Filmmaker/musician/theologian & founder of Queer Renaissance, Julia Wallace
Cave Canem fellow and writer/musician/filmmaker Kevin Simmonds
Smart, scrappy Black Girl Dangerous founder, Mia McKenzie
“Best Hyper literate Busking Outfit” (SF Weekly), Khalil Sullivan & MAD NOISE
Afrocentric feminist storytellers Griot Noir (Jessica Jordan and JDX)
Ironing Board Collective writer Carrie Leilam Love
Filmmaker and Luna Sea founder Crystal Mason
Award-winning poet/dancer/writer Kebo Drew
Poetic visionary & Vona/Lambda Literary fellow, Indira Allegra
“Inspiring and brilliant young mind” Maisha Johnson
Youth Speaks champion Joshua Merchant
Punk rock dancer Brontez Purnell
Feminist fabulist Alicia Kester
Visual alchemist Adee Roberson
Arts entrepreneur Anthony Julius Williams
Burlesque’s Basquiat, Dorian Faust
Afrofuturist healer, Elitrea Frye
and last but not least, “big, bold and beautiful treasure,”
The Lady Ms. Vagina Jenkins.

Impressive no? You might just explode from the sheer level of beauty and talent wrapped up here so brace yourself.

But “Syd”, you say, “June is almost over and what about the rest of the summer?” Don’t worry, there’s more! Like hot queers and performance? Check out Debauchery, July 15th at the White Horse Inn in the East Bay.

Debauchery is a community organized, inclusive performance, burlesque and drag revue for queers of all genders and their allies. Every third Sunday of the month at the White Horse Inn, Debauchery features a new lineup of sizzling acts, benefiting organizations working to support the queer community. It is Debauchery’s goal to provide quality entertainment and a damn good time while supporting worthwhile causes across the bay area.

Ok, so I’ll see you all soon!
xo
Syd