Contested Spaces

Often described as an art of abstraction and subjective introspection, experimental film is also invested in exploring daily objects and materials and in channeling, in the process, a peculiar perception of the modern everyday that this book calls queer materiality. Queer materiality designates the queer latency of modern material culture, which often inspired queer artists and filmmakers to envision wayward bodies and behaviors, and refers to the way in which sexual and social dissidence was embedded in the objects, technologies, substances, and spaces that make up the hardware of experience. This book studies a rich archive of queer material engagements in work by well-known filmmakers such as Andy Warhol, Barbara Hammer, Carolee Schneemann, and Jack Smith as well as under-recognized figures such as Tom Chomont, Jim Hubbard, Ashley Hans Scheirl, and Teo Hern嫕dez. Combining history, formal analysis, and theoretical reflection, author Juan A. Su嫫ez shows how plastics, glitter, mechanic