Through Queer Eyes and Soft Gazes

Pam van Manen

Visual Arts & Post-Contemporary Practice

Contact

Events

GRH 2022 Session X: Fatemi Moghadambadi, Elissa Fontana, Pam van Manen and Berendine Venemans

As a queer woman, I was confronted with gender roles and inequality within our society from an early age. Although I am keenly aware of the considerable progress that has been made in both women’s rights and queer rights and how lucky I am to be born in the twenty-first century, I also believe that we still have a long way to go. Therefore, my practice centers on the fight for equality. With this comes the potential to make a change in our society, even if it is just incremental. That, for me, is one of the main goals I hope to achieve with my artwork. Making art has always been a vessel for personal feelings throughout my life. As a result, I often make vulnerable pieces that lie close to my heart. It imbues an artwork with bravery and strength when an artist pours their heart into it, and this is the kind of artist I aim to be(come). My name is Pam van Manen, I am a twenty-four year old visual artist and poet based in Utrecht, The Netherlands. The media that my work primarily consists of are photography, collage art, poetry, spoken word, and painting. With my art, I aim to show my perspective on social issues that I am passionate about, specifically feminism, intersectionality, and queerness.

Through Queer Eyes and Soft Gazes (In Search of My Body's Liberation)

Deep down, I’ve always been aware of my queerness: an otherness about me, a deviation from the norm. We live in a world that’s shaped by societal expectations and heteronormative views: a world that constantly confronts and harms marginalised groups with this otherness. In Through Queer Eyes and Soft Gazes, I artistically explore the painful parts of growing up as a (queer) woman and how I try to free myself from these seemingly inescapable feelings. Captured through photography and poetry, I search for my body’s liberation in intimate moments and soft spaces.

In this work I explore the raw, ugly, and hard parts of growing up as a queer woman, as well as the beautiful magic that queerness and womanhood can bring. How do you look at your body? And how did society influence this view?

the (internalised) homophobia,

it still touches me every day.

though i have slowly accepted my own queerness, more and more -

over the years, the feeling of discomfort still lingers.

it is hidden in small gestures and roaming in large spaces.

it lingers through my body.

i still feel it in spaces, near people

where queerness is not yet fully accepted

i feel it when i watch the news,

i feel it in my veins

i feel it like i feel a bruise

that never really goes away.

An important part of this project was to show the softness that is queer intimacy. For this part, my partner and I aimed to capture our most intimate and soft moments together. In the final installation I aimed to recreate a similar space as the one in which we share our most intimate moments, so that the viewer can look at the photographs in a similar space as where they were taken.

This part of the project has therefore been a collaboration with my partner, Claire Mariman, who is a visual artist herself, too. For more of her beautiful work and contact, visit her instagram or website.

in your house

in your arms

my body feels

at home.

like

she is allowed to take up space.

‘cause when you look at me,

you do it with the most feminine and queer gaze

in the most loving and accepting way.

Final Installation during The Now Show

Welcome to our bedroom, feel free to take a seat (at my desk, on my bed, on the floor. wherever you'd like.) Enjoy my space. I hope you feel safe.

For this installation, a soundscape was made by Mijke van Leersum, or 'musreel'. You can listen to the soundscape and their other beautiful music here.