experiment # 3 – interview with B.

interview with B. – 23 February 2010

As a teenager and in her early 20´s, B. was part of different sub-cultures, today she is dressing out with others, on special events. If you were part of a subculture, it was required to follow the dress code not only on special occasions, but all the time, in ones everyday life. If not, one was seen as a fake, a “false”, and could not really be part of that group of people. Being part of a sub-culture, even though dressed the same as the others, they were different from the mainstream, they got attention. B. felt that while she was a punk, or a goth, she became visible. “Only” B. was invisible, people didn´t see her, or gave her attention. After the experience of being noticed, she continued to “dress out”, and joined sub-cultures.

Further on, when she grew older, she kind of let go of the extreme outlooks, and stayed more “normal”. Instead today, she dresses out on special events, like, “Zombie nights”, and the like. Why is she dressing out, I wondered. – Because it is fun! It is a break from everyday life and routines, it adds something to my life. Those experiences are valuable for my identity as well. I take something with me from the experience back to my “normal” me. It expands who I am. I feel alive.

I asked about the components of importance, dressing out at home, by herself, lacking the audience, would that be of any interest? She says that the audience, the ones outside of the group, seeing them, are an important component. While playing the role, a zombie, she moves beyond the normal frame of her, she goes outside the register and allows herself to act outside of the norm. The costume allows to act beyond the norm, people accept the “odd” behavior, cause they are only playing.

Her mother reminded her that she always have been living, acting our, manifested, inner changes in the outside, and material world. Her need to play, test, and explore are canalized through the dressing out events. The gaze of the other, the audience, play an important role on that journey; she experience herself differently through the eyes of the other, when they look differently on her in her not-normal-b. outfit. Interesting, I think, is that B. has no need, or longing for being on the stage, of acting, or interacting within her character. As the case of acting in theater, or in live role playing. For her the costume, the persona created with the costume, and the audience seeing her are the components which adds value.