Chancellor's Professor of English and Informatics Jonathan Alexander exhibits recent photographs in the international exhibition “I ME MY: SEEING ONE'S QUEER SELF” at the XYZ Gallery in Melbourne, Australia. The show features six artists creating work in the self portrait genre – beyond the selfie – to represent conceptions of self and their lived experiences.
Bringing together artists from Mexico, China, the United States and Australia, the exhibit runs through February 2025. Alexander’s first gallery show, his photographs explore the self-representation of queer subjects.
Alexander’s art practice, which ranges from inks, watercolors and acrylics to photography and collage, emerged during the pandemic, when he needed (and had the privileged opportunity) to occupy his time when not in a series of Zoom meetings.
For Alexander, “Queer people have frequently come of age at times and in environments in which we are told by others who we are, including how sinful, sick or ‘damaged’ we are as queer people. And yet, many queer folks have demonstrated creative resourcefulness in taking control of their own self-representation. Being able to explore queer creative energy in visually rich work has been a true delight — and one that has inspired me to think more robustly about the connections between written and visual forms of self-expression.”