Visibility and Visuality after 'the Transgender Tipping Point'

In 2014, TIME magazine declared a new epoch, characterized by a sudden and unprecedented increase in the cultural and political visibility of trans and gender-diverse people.¹ Ten years later, the “transgender tipping point” has come and gone: trans people in the United States today face legislative attacks in forty-two states, growing threats of physical violence, and widespread backlash against trans-inclusive efforts. In other words, this once-celebrated increase in trans representation concurred, perhaps unsurprisingly, with a rise in anti-trans sentiment. This panel provides a forum for scholars of the visual to consider the state and stakes of trans visibility today. As Che Gossett and David Getsy note, art history has of yet trailed behind the other humanities in meaningfully engaging the interdisciplinary field of trans studies,² and yet art historians and artists may be uniquely positioned to grapple with the present complexities of trans visibility politics. This panel seeks to assemble a group of historians and practitioners whose work directly addresses the problem and/or promise of trans representation; possible topics include strategies for visualizing the intricacies of trans life, trans critiques of the surveillance state, and trans rhetorics of passing or “going stealth,” among others.

¹ Katy Steinmetz, “The Transgender Tipping Point,” TIME Magazine, June 9, 2014.

² David J. Getsy and Che Gossett, “A Syllabus on Transgender and Nonbinary Methods for Art and Art History,” Art Journal 80, no. 4 (October 2, 2021): 100–115, https://doi.org/10.1080/00043249.2021.1947710.