All of Me Review

The “All of Me” event on April 14 was an up-close and personal look into the life of Queer Trans-Entity, Black Boricua performance artist and poet Ignacio Rivera. Sure, the prefix trans may evoke thoughts of sex change and cross-dressing,but as Rivera explains, trans can also imply nonconformity to traditional gender roles. Who wants to be incarcerated by social constructs, whether it is how to be lady-like or the clothes are on your back. I know personally that being a person of color is hard at times, but being a transsexual person of color, I suppose, is as tough as it gets. In addition to a genuine personality, Rivera’s work as aperformance artist and poet brings this uncommon minority perspective, which she cleverly weaves into her work.

Likesome sort of living, breathing artwork in progress, Rivera expressed herself in every way possible, from hir attire to hir pronouns. Before me, stood a stranger in a lumberjack shirt with a red undershirt peeking out at the neck and some jeans draped over a pair of Converse sneakers. Nice suit, I thought, but the faded red undershirt t-shirt said it all: “Don’t hide your pride.” This was a deliberate rhetorical move and personal statement by the artist that set up the event’s underlying theme.Before going into her performance, Rivera opened with a little bio that included the resounding rebel declaration, “Fuck the gender binary.” The audience responded with empathetic head nods, for we realized the statement’s truth as well as the artist’s authenticity. In general, people respond well to a genuine personality and so are more inclined to listen. Consequently,Rivera’s informal attire and speech instilled a sense of comfort in the room, making the performance intimate and engaging.

Every word and corresponding gesture had a purpose in her expression of self. In sober poems and comical skits, Rivera not only snubs social constructs such as gender assignment, but ze also celebrates hir trans-sexuality and Latino heritage. Not confined togender roles or any space at that, Rivera showed no fear, as ze became poetryin motion, leaving the podium to come within feet of her audience. With each poem, the audience learned how Rivera came to terms with hir unique individuality. Titles of poems included “Rediscovering Me” and “Brown Realities,” in which Rivera discussed hir construction of self in the face of a critically destructive society. The poems and skits had much substance due to the fact that they were based on experience. Rivera explained how ze was molested as a child and how ze was a sex worker. Furthermore, the use of he and she pronouns throughout her poetry illustrated Rivera’s identity crisis. Ze recently began using the gender-neutral pronoun and possessive adjective ze and hir, respectively because of their ambiguity. People do not know what to expect when they hear or see these words. Questions such as “What does that mean?” or “So, does she look like a man or woman?” pop up, thus compelling people to come and see for themselves. Also, the Latino influence emerged as Spanish danced off Rivera’s tongue in a mouthful of English. The Spanglish patois provided phonetic contrast, which broke the monotony of English sounds.

Sometimes,the recitation was stop-and-go or fluid, thus this delivery gave each poem rhythm. Rivera changed pitches to convey the changing emotion of the described moment in the poem as well as the sentimental value of the piece. She even made profanity poetic in her pornographic verses about masturbation. A raw personality, Rivera accentuated the profanity in her poems, so phrases such as“ethical slut,” fucking faggot,” and “masturbation” resounded to provoke lewd images. The verses were laced with sincerity, which once again, opened our ears and minds.