A little context...this was written during the winter holidays of 2007 while I was visiting my grandparents. It never went anywhere. However, looking back, this was the beginning of The Space Between.... I post it here now as a testament that thing do materialize. Just not always in the way or on the timeline we set.
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Dear Readers:
Over the course of the next year, my dearest friend Michael and I are starting a new project called Mutant Salon. There is no end product. Only a process. A search. An exploration. Mutant Salon are tracked correspondences. They are not hosted or posted on any website. They are between the sender and the recipient. And my hope is that I mutate as I am involved in this process.
I will most likely not be getting to a new posting before the end of the year. So...I wanted to share my initial correspondence about Mutant Salon with Michael with you. I know that future postings will be inspired by Mutant Salon. And I want to make sure there is a foundation for you as a reader to understand these future postings.
Please read on. And I look forward to our ever evolving, no ever mutating, relationship.
Peace,
Jason
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My dearest Michael:
I thought it appropriate that I started out our correspondences about Mutant Salon as a formal letter. The excitement I feel about this project and next step in our always evolving relationship is possibility, creativity, and movement. I have often used the clichéd crossroads as a metaphor to where I am. Now, either I have moved or I have simply realized the serenity of the crossroads. I feel that the simple formality of a letter captures momentarily a means of communication, relationship, and clarity that can translate my thoughts and feelings in a more personal manner.
To me, a salon is a space one enters, is welcomed, lets go, and leaves rejuvenated, alive, and inspired. You, my dearest Michael, provide all that for me. A conversation with you is better than a day at the salon, especially a six hour stint that results in blue hair.
When I conceive of this project, I think of intentionally injecting my art with the same inquiry, discovery, and revelation as we do our conversations. I want to explore and innovate and create. I want to be able to walk away from my art with a feeling of deep satisfaction in having grappled with some sort of hard concept, idea, pedagogy, philosophy, theory, paradigm, theology, etc. I am not looking for answers. I am seeking new questions – a new means of transformation.
And so I want to pose my first inquiry: What is a mutant salon?
I was completely engrossed in our phone conversation on December 22nd, 2007. I originally was interested in exploring the intersection of queer and family. I wanted, and still want, to know and delve into the vast diversity of family structures within our community.
This was spurred by a visit to the Heard Museum West, a Native American art museum in Arizona
You, my dearest Michael, are a part of my family. We are not blood-related. Nor did we grow up in the same town. Nor did we share many of the same experiences. Nor did we live near each other for a time period of extended length. So what makes us brothers? What is the thread that holds us to each other? How has this bond formed, grown, and evolved? How do you define something so indefinable?
This led me to thinking about other queers. I’ve known queers who have been shunned by their biological family and been forced to find family in a variety of places. They have had to create and build a new identity, a new culture, a whole new system of support. I am completely in awe of these individuals, of their bravery, of their will, and their innovation in transformation.
Similarly, I have seen people of multi-ethnic backgrounds and families grapple with culture, identity, and history. Am I “a” or “b”? Am I both? Am I neither? Am I all of the above? How do I reconcile my history of “a” with the history of “b” knowing that at one point ancestors “b” oppressed the ancestors of “a”? Do I have to choose? Why? Do I even exist? Who am I ?
And now that I think on this in even greater detail, I’ve heard this search in so many other places and spaces as well. I’ve heard it from children of divorced parents, individuals no longer connected to the religion of their ancestors, people questioning our government and policies, the homeless, those that are dying. I have heard these questions all of my life.
And so it gets me thinking. I see connections between the things that seem so separate. I look to my cultural reference point, pop culture, for answers, and all that I get are mutated images of my identity back. I ask my television “Who am I?” And it responds with reruns of Will and Grace – a looped utopian New York
And none of these images or responses are answers. They are just muddled attempts by others to make me into their image – an image that is one-faced and self loathing and stereotypical. I am none of these things. I am.
For me, Mutant Salon is a place and a space I can turn to open this dialogue and create art. It is a crossroads, a gathering space, a place of options. Mutant Salon is not about seeking out a reflected image, it is about collaboratively and collectively creating a pluralistic image that mutates as more and more become involved. It never stagnates. It never reflects. It never consumes. Instead, it holds correspondences. It engenders dialogue. It inspires. It moves. It mutates. It is.
I am looking forward to hearing your ideas, thoughts, inspirations. I am excited to see where we are next year. For it will not be where we are right now. It cannot be where we are right now.
My dearest Michael, thank you for the gift of family.
Your most humble and affectionate brother,
Jason Wyman
p.s. Happy New Year!
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