Opening Ceremony for Queer Futures

Our portal doesn't close when we pack up the Fantasy Museum of Trans Sporting Excellence and Portal to Other Dimensions. In fact, closing night is the Opening Ceremony for Queer Futures!! 

Part ceremony, part funeral, part ritual, part party, the Opening Ceremony will serve a hot  lineup of performances from local drag legends Radha, Kaotic Dezires and Val Volkov, and the debut of CLUBSCORE's own drag deity Mister Butch Venividivici. PLUS - pies, off-brand soft drinks, and a playlist of queer sports adjacent tunes.

This not-quite-party-experience will be something like the queer version of the Sydney 2000 Olympics Opening Ceremony, but organised by sports goths on a tiny budget, showing it at the school sports carnival. Kind of like a cross between a seance, and your family taking you to McDonalds after soccer on a Saturday.

Wear your best sports uniform, something that feels magical, or just whatever you're comfortable in, and join CLUBSCORE as we open the portal and call the future we want into being!

ACCESS

The venue is wheelchair accessible by lift. The event will be Auslan interpreted. There will be some seating available, and room to stand or sit on the floor.

If you have access requirements, please list them on the form when you book. You can also email clubscore.cbr@gmail.com to discuss your access requirements, or to request a copy of the Experience Guide.

CONTENT ADVICE

While this event is not specifically created for children, they are welcome to join, at their parents discretion and with supervision. We have not included an 'age limit', as all kids are different, but we are very happy to chat with you if you would like more details or advice about bringing your kid(s) - just email us at clubscore.cbr@gmail.com

Kaotic Dezire's drag act will utilise fake blood and make references to death and dying.

There may be some swearing throughout the evening and there will be lots of references to queer themes.

ABOUT THE PERFORMERS

Mister Butch Venividivici

Mister Butch has travelled through space and time especially to sing the new CLUBSCORE anthem, which has been co-written by Sia Ahmad, Gus McGrath, Nick Delatovic and Ketura Budd.

Kaotic Dezires

Welcome to meeting Kaotic Dezires an ancient toybox of holding, filled with the hidden truth, told through the eyes of the toys we discard as mere playthings. They will engulf you into the madness of what dwells in the deep crevices of the mind, luring you down paths less traveled, questioning your sanity. Prepare for a restless slumber. Just as Harbard is an escort to the underworld, allow us to escort you to Midians Sanctuary.

Radha 

Shahmen Suku is a Singaporean currently living and working in Australia. He explores ideas of racial, religious and cultural identity, gender roles, the home and the kitchen, food and storytelling. Growing up in a modern matriarchal Indian family in Singapore, Shahmen processes his sense of displacement from home as Radha, the Diva from India. Moving to Australia has given Shahmen multiple perspectives on migration, culture, race, colonisation and gender identity. Shahmen discusses these issues openly through his alter ego, Radha, sharing stories the way she learnt them from his mother’s kitchen. Radha’s multifaceted practice has also seen them perform/host numerous music festivals and events, presented in Art Exhibitions, shows and workshops for kids and also a chef on the ABC’s The Set. Radha will be cooking up and serving a special Sports Drink!

Val Volkov

Val Volkov's one true love, is calisthenics – a uniquely Australian dance sport that presently has a “female only” policy for performers 14 years or over. This wasn’t a problem when he enrolled as a 6-year-old little girl, but it did make him hesitate to transition until age 21. To his knowledge, he is the first medically transmasculine calisthenics performer. A pioneer against his will; this uncharted territory was daunting to venture into. The calisthenics community in the ACT rose to the occasion with surprising openness. Though Val still shaves his face before competitions as not to ruffle feathers of older judges, he is relieved to continue moving through space without reservation – a freedom he feels only under the heat of stage lights. The only point in time his motions aren’t uninhibited by the discerning glare of strangers’ eyes is when he is dancing. His body feels most at home in a leotard, despite them doing nothing to hide his pre-op chest. Dance is reprieve from dysphoria, allowing him to simply be. To love his body and revel in its power. No longer being blanket-addressed as “ladies” by competition adjudicators also feels nice.

Inspired by Russian folklore and phoenix mythology, Incandescence is a dance performance which interrogates the gendered nuances of movement conventions, as well as binarized structures in dance institutions. As the Russian language assigns gender to all actions, to transition is to semantically alter the gendered nature of all of one’s movements. Stravinsky’s Firebird is transformed by Volkov into an exploration of what it means to be trans man in a “female only” dance sport. The firebird is a powerful yet unattainable creature, one that is desired but cannot be possessed. Its portrayals in story and dance are heavily associated with the feminine – to yearn for the unattainable and in turn be yearned for. The phoenix is a wonder of metamorphosis – a becoming through fire. Its mystical origins embody the resilience, beauty, grace, strength, and otherworldly power of transness. The divergent flame-fowl coalesce in a reclamation of chaos femininity and a celebration of finely-preened flamboyance. Binarized archetypes are reimagined through organic movement; organic in the sense that it is unhindered by consequences of perception. The magic of trans bodies in motion incinerates the cages of our captors. We bring a reckoning by fire – that heat which drives our souls to keep burning brightly and breathes life from our tears.