ABSTRACT
This chapter takes as its question, “what do transgender/gender fluid/nonbinary people look like?” With the rise in public discourse about transgender individuals and the issues they face, many cisgender people struggle to imagine what a transgender or nonbinary person looks like, beyond the cartoonish representations of them in mass media and popular culture, which resemble how gays and lesbians were presented before then. In other words, the representation of sexual others in the past bears a direct link to trans and nonbinary representation today. This representation has direct effects upon public perceptions of the trans community, as well as on its members.
This chapter will offer a brief historical contextualization of the parallels between the struggle for gay/lesbian rights and representation and contemporary efforts to enhance transgender visibility and authentic representation. Petry will examine the work of artists Del LaGrace Volcano, Artor Jesus Inkerö, Blake Little, and Åsa Johannesson, with excerpts from an interview with Johannesson. All the artists are engaged in interrogating and improving the integrity of such representations, even as efforts to demonize and diminish transgender or nonbinary people continue.
