When I was a little teenager, lost in my dorky fantasy worlds of books and daydreams, where I could pretend I was pretty and smart and interesting, I came across an amazing book in my library. It wasn't anything in the young adult fantasy section (a shock, I know) or a crazy internet love story written by another dorky girl on the other side of the world, or even Jung on psychology (though, I read that too- snooze fest)- It was a photographic coffee table book of Thierry Mugler's fashion creations.
Thierry Mugler is one of the most amazing fashion designers. Besides the fact that he made a hot motorcycle bodice, has taken the robotic woman motif and re-created it over and over, or even his recent forays into label cliches like perfume design and blah blah blah, it is really his hyper-feminine construct that has lasted in my mind over the years.
Hyper-femininity:
Where a cis gendered female or trans person has performed a stereotypically female gender construct to the extreme. I think that many drag queens would argue that they embody a type of hyper-femininity when performing, so I hardly accept that ONLY cis gendered women can be hyper-feminine.
The point I'm trying to get to is that hyper-femininity is a type of gender performance. The desire to dress in the extreme of one's gender may be to act out a social role- or, is it to push the bounds of gender and force a type of reaction? Hyper-femininity as a type of masquerade is a valuable concept. There are loaded ideas attached to the icons of: Lipstick. High heels. Hips. Breasts. Lips. Eyes. Hairdos. Dress. Underwear. Can a woman ever escape her gender? Or, is there forever an iconic Womanliness that she must reject, compare to or embody?
There is a certain fascination in me for gender binaries, and how those binaries can be subverted. I think that an entirely feminine woman is uplifted by a hint of hyper-masculinity exposed. When we see the clash of leather and lace the sexuality is immediately apparent- There is a contrast in the iconography of leather, traditionally associated with hunting, killing, skinning animals, James Dean's bad boy image, and a world of hyper-masculinity, placed parallel with lace, made by women to decorate women, acting as a symbol of luxury and languish to adorn a bride, a lady or a debutante.
As Clea Maison on the L Word states, the boxer-briefs under dresses, and lingerie under suits, is a contrast that is "sexy". But, more than that, it is sexually exotic. Temptation, I like to imagine, was not for Eve to eat the apple, but by eating the apple she gives herself permission to realise her femaleness- and then she attempts to clothe it. Clothes themselves are symbols of debauchery. Our shame, leading to covering up, is loaded with the desire to uncover.
Part of the beauty of the gender divide is the ability to transcend it. Without gender extremes this ability cannot exist. Unless a woman accepts the hyper-feminine construct as the stereotype she's playing out she cannot USE that construct and destroy it in one go. Without this ability... well. We'd all look pretty fucking boring, wouldn't we.
And, it's not all about gender either. To subvert racial stereotypes one must accept that they exist. Age. Culture. Sexual orientation. Fuck, hair colour. These stereotypes exist. It's all very well and good for some people to say embracing the stereotype won't further your cause. But pride in who you are will. I am a woman, I am not ashamed, and in my world of fairy floss pink, where I AM pretty and smart and interesting, I use gender performativity to realise who am, beneath the clothes.
Danni
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