Beyond Binary

Saturday, September 17, 2022 to Thursday, October 27, 2022

Weekend hours added: Saturday October 22 and Sunday October 23, noon to 4 p.m.

Beyond Binary focuses on the exploration of a gender spectrum, across cultures and generations, in the formation of personal and collective identities and visual narratives. Beyond Binary celebrates trans and gender-nonconforming artists who engage the body as both a form and site of social sculpture and who challenge established narratives of art history to become more inclusive, while working across media and transdisciplinarily.

Participating artists: Cassils, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Craig Calderwood, Wells Chandler, Jeffrey Cheung, Ben Cuevas, Demian DinéYazhi', Nicki Green, Juliana Huxtable, MCXT (Monica Canilao + Xara Thustra), E. "Oscar" Maynard, Vivek Shraya, Beatrice L. Thomas aka "Black Benatar," Eli Thorne, Alok Vaid-Menon, Chris E. Vargas, Leila Weefur, J Wu, and Asri Wulandari.

Organized by the Fine Arts Gallery's Sharon E. Bliss and Kevin B. Chen in collaboration with independent writer and curator Roula Seikaly.

View the Beyond Binary Catalog (PDF)

Public Programs in the Fine Arts Gallery:

• Leila Weefur in conversation Jo-ey Tang  Wednesday, October 5, 12:30 to 1:30 p.m.

Jo-ey Tang is a Hong Kong-born American curator, artist, writer, in non-hierarchical order. He began working alongside artists at The Notary Public in 2010 in his New York City apartment while a graduate student at New York University. He was arts editor of literary journal n+1 from 2009 to 2014, curator at Palais de Tokyo, Paris in 2014 and 2015, and director of exhibitions at Beeler Gallery at Columbus College of Art & Design, from 2017 to 2020, and digital community manager of Denniston Hill, New York in 2021. He currently lives in San Francisco, where he serves as director of KADIST San Francisco. Read more about Jo-ey Tang.

• Demian DinéYazhi' & Ari Banias reading, sponsored by the Poetry Center  Thursday, October 6^th, 1 to 2 p.m.

Ari Banias is the Poetry Center’s Mazza Writer in Residence for Fall 2022 and the author of A Symmetry (W. W. Norton, 2021), and Anybody (W. W. Norton, 2016), a finalist for the Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the PEN Center USA Literary Award. His poems appear in American Poetry Review, Georgia Review, Hyperallergic, Kenyon Review, Poetry, A Public Space, The Nation, The New Republic, Triple Canopy, The Yale Review, and in We Want it All: An Anthology of Radical Trans Poetics (Nightboat, 2020). Read more about Ari Banias.

• Asri Wulandari in conversation with Dr. Kathy Zarur  Friday, October 14, 12:30 to 1:30 p.m.

Kathy Zarur is Associate Professor of Art History at Skyline College. Her curatorial work has been featured at the San Francisco Arts Commission, Museum of the African Diaspora, Minnesota Street Project, San Francisco State University, Kearney Street Workshop and the Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center. She has produced conferences about art history and pedagogy with San Francisco State University, the de Young Museum, and the Asian Art Museum. Read more about Kathy Zarur.

• Drag Queen Story Hour with Beatrice L. Thomas aka “Black Benatar”  Friday, October 21, 10 to 11 a.m.

DQSH captures the imagination and play of the gender fluidity of childhood and gives kids glamorous, positive, and unabashedly queer role models. In spaces like this, kids are able to see people who defy rigid gender restrictions and imagine a world where everyone can be their authentic selves. Beatrice L. Thomas aka “Black Benatar” is a national multi-disciplinary artist, cultural strategist, and creative producer. Whether through creative production, consulting or equity, diversity, and inclusion workshops, Mx. Thomas' focus is on uplifting and centering queer, transgender, and POC voices, with special attention to creating queer-inclusive family programming. They are a pillar of Drag Queen Story Hour, serving as director of the SF Bay Area chapter, on the Leadership Team for the national organization, and as a featured drag queen. (source: kennedy-center.org)

This exhibition is made possible by major funding from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and support from SF State's School of Art and Instructionally Related Student Activities Fund. The public programs are supported by an Extraordinary Ideas grant from SF State's College of Liberal & Creative Arts.