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She Leaves at Dawn (Mulan)

Influenced by the Chinese folk song, the Ballad of Mulan, I explore performativity as it relates to my own identity as a Chinese and trans artist. In re-interpreting passages from the original work into my own perspective, I examine my personal conflicts and relationships to gender and family.

Awards

World Photo Annual

2023

Bronze

Portrait

Professional

Honorable Mention

Conceptual

Professional

Nominee

Fine Art

Professional

She Leaves at Dawn (Mulan)

Influenced by the Chinese folk song, the Ballad of Mulan, I explore performativity as it relates to my own identity as a Chinese and trans artist. In re-interpreting passages from the original work into my own perspective, I examine my personal conflicts and relationships to gender and family.

About Artist

kef zheng

kef is an artist from Vernon, Connecticut, currently based in the city of Portland, Maine— attempting to navigate her existence as an Asian American trans artist. kef is interested in how sense of identity and relationships to the world are constructed through encountered ideas and representations. Her work engages with themes such as gender and performativity, personal relationships, and the violence of the Western and cisnormative male gaze. In kef's work she identifies with a reality of being rejected by a world, in search of solidarity and connecting with others who contend with a similar existence. kef works closely with the notion of intercorporeality- the ensembles of touch, connection, embodied intimacy, and identification that circulate between subjects. The subversion that her practice performs is not in the image or in the representation, but in the simple act of being able to be next to one another.

kef zheng

Photographic Areas of Focus

Fine Art

Location

United States of America

Explore Other Winners

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People's Vote Award
Nominee
Debbie Todd

Debbie Todd

Portrait

Bronze
Alena Grom

Alena Grom

Portrait

Honorable Mention
Mohammad Fayzul Mowla

Mohammad Fayzul Mowla

Portrait

Nominee
Radek von Hirschberg

Radek von Hirschberg

Portrait

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