Lisa Gornick is the only out lesbian filmmaker in the UK who has been consistently making feature films dealing with lesbian life experiences. Her work goes beyond the coming out stories and deals with the complex and contradictory feelings women have for each when sustaining long term lesbian relationships.

You started out as a stand up and actress why the move behind the camera?
Before I got into performing, I was making things up with drawing and words. It was only by the good chance to find a great Saturday drama class that I began to perform too. As a teenager, I was shy and a little frustrated by things so the spontaneity of improvisation was such an amazing release.

I’d always loved going to the cinema more than the theatre in a way - even though I acted mainly on stage - so, I did some studying of video at Battersea adult institute and then went to Bristol University’s post graduate course to study filmmaking - but with the advent of digital filmmaking I really began to take risks and to think maybe I liked this move behind the camera.

You have a ‘just do it’ attitude to filmmaking and you have made 2 features using guerilla filmmaking tactics. Why this route and not the more formal one?
With the low cost of digital and the fact that I had a camera and a computer with editing software, I thought why wait for the green lights of external approval in making a film. I have to say I was feeling pretty depressed about things and it did seem the only was up, to quote Yazz, in terms of just starting to shoot a film.

I saw Festen and was amazed by the potential beauty of shooting on a Sony PD100 - the same camera I had and still have.

Acting to me seemed about waiting. I didn’t want that to happen to  me again. I also realised that once I started and had people, like Campbell, who did camera in both films - give me not only practical help in terms of shooting but also encouragement in terms of the production of the film and getting on with it. I thought to go for it.

I never really explored the formal way because in the early days of making my films, I wanted to do it, not spend ages talking about what I was about to do. I’m now ready to attempt the pitch and I think now I am intrigued to explore the more formal route in terms of waiting at the red light for it to turn green in terms of getting funding.

How would you describe your filmmaking style?
In terms of Do I Love You? and Tick Tock Lullaby my two features I’d describe my filmmaking style as using film/comedy/performance to work out something that is troubling or worrying me. My first desire is not STORY. Everywhere I go that is the sacred filmmaking mantra - what is the story? For so so long, I used to get bored when people asked that. I’d make up a story just to please them with an answer and realised as I was speaking that it wasn’t working.

I’m more interested in using film to explore human dilemmas. Both my films so far have centred around questions around female sexuality - if I want to really give it a label which I know my instincts resist.

I would start by getting up early and writing dialogues around the subject. Then when I get hooked on various characters, I would begin to dream up scenarios and build a certain trajectory for them to follow. So I can’t totally rule out narrative elements.

When I felt I had enough dialogues, or more I was getting lonely, I decided to find the actors. I would say that my films tend to be performer focussed. I am more excited by the actors than I am by smooth and perfected camera moves or exquisite set design. It’s what comes naturally to me and I find it the most compelling part of the filmmaking process.

Where do you draw your influences from?
We are drawing influences all the time. The majority are from friends and family members who often remain unheralded in this type of question as filmmakers tend to trot out Chantal Akerman, Jane Campion, Dorothy Arzner, Jean Luc Godard, Woody Allen and John Cassavetes - all of whom I have watched over the years and been hooked into (as well as countless others).

So many other filmmakers, playwrights and writers have found their way into my pscyhe. You look at how they work and see if this fits with you. But they are the named ones. There are masses of influences from comments friends and family say. Or a picture in a gallery. Or something briefly seen on the internet or television. Or a moment in the street that influences me greatly.

Why do you do the risky thing of mining your personal life for your films?
I’m sure so much goes back to those early improvisation classes as a teenager. The sense of focus that I seemed to get when asked to improvise around my own experience was so intense that it stayed with me as a creative source.

I have always loved the honesty of the writer. The first person writing of cartoonists, authors and filmmakers. A lot of them were men, worrying about the women in their lives. I would still relate to them even though they were often skinny yet macho heterosexual men. A slight irritation as they described their antics was overcome by an intense wonder at their honesty.

I suppose the biggest risk is the fact that it seems to be reality. Once your own personal dilemmas have been routed through into a creative act/performance - they really aren’t objective realism. They are portraits not photographs. There is always a fictional coating on it.

Who is the intended audience for your work?
I don’t work in the way that funders and the market analysers say you should work - that is know who your audience is. If I said my audience was women from the age of 18 to 45 lets say. Then what about the 75 year old heterosexual couple that came to see Tick Tock Lullaby with Obama badges, or the sixteen year old Korean boys or the 22 year old men in Johannesburg who came up to me after my film.

I don’t like targetting audiences. Let people find you and relate to the film however they want to. I love it that teenage boys who are always fed guns and rushing and shouting want to see a group of thirty something women worrying about whether to be a mother or not.

What was the response to your last film Tick Tock Lullabuy?
The producer in me just wants to mention the good moments - those teenage boys who loved the film, the women that came up to me and said keep making films and the young girls who loved the honesty in the films.

There are retractors (don’t worry I hear you) - I presume some tend to worry about my organic process of filmmaking - it’s not a conventional STORY - with beautiful people doing beautiful things and being ecstatically happy about it. Or in terms of the lesbian characters in the film, they are rounded people, women who question things in their lives including their past and present feelings about men. Some lesbians are a bit disturbed by that, but it’s my honest expression. We are none of us perfect.

What are you working on at the moment?
I am working on two new features and also writing some episodic ideas. I soon will start talking about these on the web. The most I can say is that if anyone is interested come to my MySpace page,  I’ll keep you hooked in with my new projects. It will be really lovely to have you there.

Links
Tick Tock Lullaby MySpace page
Valliant Doll
Valliant Doll YouTube

Viva Voce Virus directed by Kathleen Bryson and Kimmo Moykky. Viva Voce Virus is a wild vivid surreal film sci film which deals with the history of queer actors in the cinema being terrified of being ‘outed’. The main story is of the actress Ronnie played by Deni Francis who thinks to be successful she needs to employ the well-worn tactic of having a “beard” boyfriend. Ironically she is playing part a lesbian vampire in the contemporary remake of a B-movie written by dyke director Gloria LaFonche in the 1950’s.

The film draws on the gossip of old Hollywood in a Kenneth Angerish adventure thorugh the history of the closet. Meanwhile the other narrative includes two space travellers who exist in a fantasy world where men can suddenly find their best friend attractive and keep coming back for the blue cocktails in Gay Andy’s.

You are a writer primarily, why now a move into filmmaking?
I don’t think of myself being primarily anything! The truth is I have always done three arts, not one.
Writing, painting and filmmaking/acting. I came over to London to do a post-grad in acting originally in 1994, and in 1997 I was finishing up my MA in film theory right as I started to write my first novel, Mush. I actually began writing/developing The Viva Voce Virus the same year that Mush was published, 2001. I show my paintings every few years as well.

The reason it seems that filmmaking is a recent move is because feature-filmmaking by nature is sloooooooowww, and thats compounded when doing a micro-budget feature. I can whip up a short story in a matter of days: feature films - not so speedy!

What inspired you to make the Viva Voce Virus film?
Two things:

1. A dream I had in 1996 about a satirical movie where two “straight” men crash-landed into an all-gay resort where all the drag queens wore blue terrycloth bathrobes and stirred their blue cocktails with sparkly swizzlesticks. I pretty much dreamt the entire opening scene.

1. An audition I’d had in 2001 where I was one of the final 5 standing out of the original 90, and was on the third callback for a part for which I was eminently qualified. I’d already done the acting audition twice over, and this was just a verbal interview. I saw one of the casting director’s face change when I mentioned a girlfriend. It was kind of horrifically amazing as he struggled to compose himself. You wouldn’t think that type of prejudice exists among liberal people in theatre or film until you experience it first hand. The rule I broke wasn’t being queer - obviously, that’s very common - the rule I broke was talking openly about it.

You co-directed the Viva Voce Virus with Kimmo Moykky - what were the challenges of working collaboratively?
I am fiery yang to his more peaceful yin, which turned out to be complementary when working together. We have spookily similar artistic taste when it comes to films, literature, themes and aesthetics. If we had different opinions about how a shot should be set up, for example, we would both listen to the other person’s reasoning. If we could give a good justification and wanted it more, then the other
person would acquiesce. We kind of kept an unofficial tally: “Hey, you got your way last time, so it’s my turn now.” It balanced!

In six years we only had one 5-minute real argument, and that was the last week of production when we were probably missing like 50 hours of sleep. The real challenge was communicating long-distance during the post-production period once I had moved back to the United States. But we weathered that. We’ll definitely work together again and are actually in development with a second feature together, a futuristic horror piece in the 21 Days Later mode. We’ve been through some very trying situations and it’s great to know that you can be dear friends on the other side of that.

One of the themes about the Viva Voce Virus is the homosexual closet. Why do you think female actresses still stay in the closet more than male actors?
There are a lot of actresses who come out as bisexual, and I believe they truly are. But then what happens is you only ever hear about their boyfriends, and the media colludes with their publicists when they’re dating women to play that aspect down. Two good examples there are Drew Barrymore and Angelina Jolie. The media has no interest either in promoting sexual fluidity - that is just too threatening to consider, because that means any straight person could be the next to come out. Secondly, the almighty cock trumps all. You have men who have made a point of acknowledging their bisexuality like Alan Cumming or Gore Vidal being labeled  as “gay” while  women who call themselves bisexual who have had established relationships with other women being called “straight”. See the pattern? It always defaults to the male member.

With actresses, you’re already working inside this sexist system, and I reckon often it just becomes too much to deal with when compounded with homophobia. There’s a heartbreaking quote from the actress Tammy Lynn Michaels from an interview she did with Television Without Pity, where she says, “My managers and all my agents would be like [frantically], “Don’t tell them you’re gay! You’ll be ruined! You’ll never work again! You’ll be working at McDonald’s in a month!” I was so terrified.” There is incredible pressure to be conventionally attractive in a typically “feminine” mode - and to be perceived as straight.

What do you think about Lyndsay Lohan coming out? What difference will it make?
Lindsay Lohan and Sam Ronson are interesting, because in a way they’re just going ahead with their relationship without make a big to-do about it. They’re behaving as if it is already an ideal-world situation where everyone accepts lesbian couples on par with straight ones, and more power to them for that.

It’s not as if Hollywood isn’t predominately gay already, so I doubt they’re shunned. Also there are many gay and lesbian couples who are well known in Hollywood that go under the mainstream radar, most of whom who have straight “lovers”-cum-beards for public consumption.

From what I understand, Sam is not the first woman with whom Lindsay has had a relationship - just the first that the general public has picked up on. This wasn’t helped, of course, by Lindsay’s publicists or whoever was working overtime over the last few years to emphasize just how heterosexual she was. This plan really backfired, may I say, as Lindsay started to be seen as slutty and also, perhaps not coincidentally, begin to show signs of emotional strain. My hunch is there are several other public starlets with very well-known breakdowns who have been having lesbian affairs. It must be difficult to deal with the cognitive dissonance of lying to the public and sometimes to oneself.

Your film is very multicultural, was that a conscious choice?
Both Kimmo and myself talked about it at the beginning and decided that we wanted so-called colour-blind casting, and agreed we didn’t conceive of any characters as being African-Caribbean, or Caucasian, or Asian, and we decided that we would cast instead according to gut instinct (with the exception of the lead Deni Francis, whom I actually had in mind while writing the script).

When I wrote the main character Ronnie’s girlfriend, Madeleine, for example, I had a vision in my head of her being blonde and white and perhaps somewhat snotty - I loosely based her on some of the women I’d met working in publishing. But then when we had Semsem Kuheri read for the part, all of a sudden there was a new way of conceptualising the character of Madeleine. There are sometimes good arguments for ethnic-specific casting, but often there aren’t and I think white directors/casting agents/producers have a responsibility to examine their pre-conceived character casting notions.

Something I really love about Mike Figgis films is that he has a variety of people from different backgrounds and they’re not there as tokens or meant to represent something, but are present as true characters. And recently you get TV series like Gray’s Anatomy and Dexter, where the same thing is going on in terms of casting, and that’s just bloody refreshing.

On a semi-related note, at one point in the middle of production, Kimmo and I looked at each other and realized that all of the villains in The Viva Voce Virus were white, which was interesting. That wasn’t a conscious choice, either. I am not sure how that happened, but it seemed fitting that the evil people who had the most power in the film would also be operating from a more powerful angle of relational dynamics when it came to race. They were also all closet cases as well, of course.

There are men and women, straights and gays in a queer film which rocks, why did you go against the grain?
Because that’s what makes up my personal world. Gay men, lesbians, bisexuals and straight people. Although if you look carefully, there are actually allusions to every single character being to some extent queer, including Ronnie’s straight male best friend. Not all of them are closeted, either, just sexually fluid. And come on, people, not all of us exist in a sexually segregated world. If that makes it harder to label The Viva Voce Virus as a “gay film” or a “lesbian film”, then so be it. You can’t argue with the fact that it’s a queer film, though; it just happened to be a queer film for men, women, straights, gays, lesbians and bisexuals… and others.

When do you plan to show the Viva Voce Virus in the UK?
We just finished the final cut in June and are starting to send it off to festivals this month, so once we’re accepted to a festival in the UK, you better believe we’ll be there, with bells on. Perhaps wearing blue terrycloth bathrobes and brandishing sparkly swizzlesticks.

Links
Viva Voce Virus
Viva Voce Virus blog
Kathleen Bryson’s blog personal blog
Viva Voce Virus Facebook
Viva Voce Virus MySpace

Del LaGrace Volcano is important to us at Friction because he is a visual artist who has consistently produced challenging works for queer people and straight people alike. From the initially controversial Love Bites to the mainstream adoption of  his work in Sex and the City television series,  Del has remained attached to his feminist and queer politics. He has recently published Femmes of Power an exploration of queer femininity in collaboration Ulrika Dahl, femme activist and academic.

Why did you choose photography as your medium?
When I was a teenager I had no idea I would be interested in using photography as a medium for political activism or self expression. In 1976 I hitch-hiked around Europe for 6 months with my best friend Stacey, who had an old Rolliflex camera and I was impressed.

When I returned to my small town in California I enrolled at my local community college and took every photography and film class that was going and had the good fortune to find two excellent teachers who mentored me and nurtured my talent and enthusiasm. I quickly got jobs in photography and as I was entirely self supporting I needed to be able to do something I liked, was good at, and, could make money with as well. I became totally obsessed with photographic alchemy and history.

Photography as a medium is perfect for my personality and temperament. It allows me an excuse to develop relationships with all kinds of people and is something I can do alone, at my own pace, in my own way.

When you started to show your photos publicly how was your work received?
I started to exhibit from the early 80’s at one-night-only lesbian only events receiving positive feedback.   However in 1989 I was asked to curate an exhibition called The Lesbian Gaze at the Young Unknowns Gallery in London. I exhibited  (“The Ceremony”) my series of very romantic series of images. And because there was a bit of leather, rubber, a wedding veil, two tits and a Muir cap some of the more politically correct lesbians declined to exhibit with me. There seemed to be a real fear that these images which reflected the lives and sexual politics of myself and my friends would contaminate the larger lesbian social fabric.

My first book, LOVEBITES was banned by Sisterwrite, Gays the Word and Silvermoon bookstores, as well as by US Customs (for two weeks), but that only made people more curious enough to buy the book!

I have shown with some big names in many group exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world:Cindy Sherman; Robert Mapplethorpe; Gilbert & George; Paul McCarthy; John Coplans; Andy Warhol…you get the picture, right. Even thought it has given me another line in my CV, it doesn’t translate into sales. In these big shows only the ‘blue chip’ artists are written about or promoted or sold. Artists like myself give the exhibition ‘street cred’.

How has that committment to ‘otherness’ affected your access to funds?
My theory is that because I refuse to be (an)”other” victim and instead present both my self, my life story and the people who allow me to re-present them as heroes; to be admired, and desired, rather than ‘tolerated’ or ‘assimilated’ I don’t get funded or feted.

I have no respect for the way in which the mainstream media, the funding bodies and society in general treat those of us who are ‘other’. Let’s face it. Most people who are successful artists come from upper middle-class white backgrounds and it’s a closed shop.

Exceptions do occur and those exceptions make the members of the dominant class feel better about themselves. If they can have an Issac Julian or Jean-Michel Basquiat on their books then they feel themselves to be immune from charges of racism or elitism. Where are the queer women of colour in the mainstream art world? Where are the gender queer artists?

Why have you continued to work in the queer world when other peers have left it behind?
There’s a common perception that working from a subcultural position is reductive. That it is a (lesser) choice that no one would make if they could have popular, mainstream recognition. It’s certainly true that most of my peers who have become ‘famous’ and financially successful seem to have left the queer world behind them.

I remember working with Jeannette Winterson when she was coordinating September in the Pink, the first queer arts festival in London in 1984. She was quite politicized back then, in terms of both sexuality and class. But as she moved up the class ladder she pulled it up behind her.

If you’re white and rich it’s no longer important (to say) if you are a lesbian or not.  Annie Leibowitz, the celebrity photographer is a case in point.  To politicize either your gender or your sexuality is seen as passé and crass in the upper echelons of society. It seems that full human membership only exists for those who have the luxury of being classless (read: super rich), and colour blind (read: white)

First and foremost I am a political person. I refuse to allow my work to be commodified or to appeal to the lowest common denominator, lesbian or otherwise, in order to achieve financial success. But then again, I haven’t been tested. No corporate powers or fancy curators have come knocking on my door and for the most part I am still being asked to work for free. THAT is something I would like to see change in the queer world! We owe it to ourselves to be paid whenever possible and at the same time it’s important to give back to the communities that support us.

How has your gender and name change altered your relationship to the queer world and your subjects?
The name thing has always  been something that is a bit complicated but also fun and meaningful to me. I’ve had a number of names, legal and social, in my (ohmygod) five decades! And they’ve all felt right at the time.

If I had remained Della Grace (and relatively gender normative) would I have had a different trajectory into the ‘high art’ world? Is that something I even want?  We all face hundreds and thousands of life altering choices and what might have been or even what you think should have been is what it is now, because of those choices.

I could have been Debby Would,  a suburban mid-western Mormon housewife with grandkids already. I’m kind of happy about the way I’ve constructed my life.

What was the difference in working on Femmes of Power compared to The Drag King Book?
From a technical point of view it was easier to work on Femmes of Power than The Drag King Book simply because I was using a digital camera. This meant it was cheaper and lighter to transport the equipment around. On a personal level there was the challenge of my ‘masculine’ persona. Of course everyone I worked with knows me as a “herm” rather than a man or even a transman, BUT there are still levels on which we are all programmed to respond to masculinity, the voice, the visual cues and so with people who never knew me as “Della Grace” I had to work a bit harder to make sure that the dynamics between us weren’t re-creating the power imbalances that often exist between a ‘male’ photographer and female subject.

There were a couple of instances in the three years of making work that I felt these dynamics were present, usually in contexts where it wasn’t possible to spend time with people in the way I usually need to. I believe that those images don’t have the level of intimacy and engagement that I feel are important and consequently those images did not make it into the book.

When I worked with younger, queer femmes of colour, I became aware of myself as being not only more ‘male’ but more ‘white’. The history of colonialization , slavery and sexual violence means that a whole lotta baggage comes into the mix. If and when I am perceived as an older white male photographer making images of young, femme women of colour I do whatever I can to acknowledge, disrupt and disown the power vested in me through institutionalized cultural racism and sexism.

Although working this way does take a lot of time and energy it feels important to engage with the people I work with in as deep a way as each encounter will allow. And this is something I try to do with everyone I work with, not only queers of colour!

How do the images in Femmes of Power challenge how society views femininity?
If you look at the vast majority of images of women in the mainstream and lesbian and gay media what you see are images of women performing gender normativity. I call it the “skinny white chicks” syndrome. In this kind of image if a woman is looking back at the spectator (usually assumed to be a white male) it is to make sure he knows she’s available for immediate consumption. It’s true that there are now more women who are active in images rather than always passive, and that’s a good thing, but it’s still not happening enough.

I would also say that it is not the purpose of an individual photograph in Femmes of Power to challenge dominant images of femininity but one has to look at the book as a whole. One has to look at the collaborative process with the subjects, Ulrika (my collaborator)  and  the designer, Elina.

The process of creation of the images challenges conventional and sexist notions of what it means to be femme-ninist and queer. I’m a big fan of the back story and process is key in feminist pedagogy.

Symbolically and literally the images take up a lot of space. Filling public space with femme magnificence, be that making a trans-femme-nist political intervention in the corridors of a Swedish hospital  with Andy Candy or on a pool table in Decatur, Alabama with the Femme Mafia is not something nice girls were taught to do!

What’s next for you?
I’m in the research and development phase of a project that is about home, belonging, gender, immigration, identity and creating community across cultures. Can’t say more than that right now though! Stay tuned!

Links

Del LaGrace Volcano main website
Del LaGrace Volcano MySpace
Del LaGrace Volcano Facebook
Femmes of Power MySpace
Femmes of Power Facebook Group
Femmes of Power at Serpents Tail
Femmes of Power at Amazon