August Newsletter: Nature is Doing Drag
Late Summer Maximalism // The Art of Failure
Have you been for a meandering walk in your neighbourhood lately? I love the excess and maximalism of late summer plants. Stalks and branches reaching every which way, alien seed pods covered in wild shapes, shiny neon berries dripping from the branches, flowers so heavy that the plants lay lazily over a fence, dropping their petals wherever they land like piles of dirty clothes flung from a suitcase after a beach trip.
I’ve always thought the contradictory insistence that women be “naturally” beautiful and not be too much was funny- (I know it's a way to suggest subjecting to rigorous beauty standards but being careful to make that work invisible and not have any fun with it), but have you ever looked at a sunset? Nature is always doing the most.
These late summer meanders have got me thinking about Jack Halberston’s the Queer art of Failure- a very formative text for me. The book explores the generative possibilities of failure and its uniquely Queer art. I’ve always found beauty to be the most integrated and empowering when I thought of it as an enhanced expression of my iterative self. As a gender non-conforming person, I’ve already failed one of the fundamental rules of beauty- and that's left a lot of possibility for exploration. Success in beauty is controlled and narrow- but there are sooooo many ways to be “too much.” Late summer plant excess offers heaps of inspiration on how all of us can generatively fail at beauty standards. Maybe size up your false lashes, pull out your hot pink lipstick, mix patterns and textures in unsettling ways, and grow gardens of unexpected body hair?
Links
A song to do your skincare routine to.
I’ve been loving this Toronto-based hair care company for my course, dry, loose curls :)