Week 1: Transmongolian by Alvaro Laiz

Thursday, July 24, 2014 Ching Lea Yee 0 Comments

Initially, for Exercise 1 "(Extra)Ordinary", I wanted to capture portraits of transgender people in Singapore. Through the project, I wanted to raise awareness of what it means to be transgender and hope that people would be more accepting of gender diversity. This is because among the LGBT community, transgender people are usually tolerated, rather than accepted, and ridiculed the most often. The idea of the project is that transgender people are just ordinary people who are born extraordinary. However, due to limited resources and time constraints, this project is not feasible at the moment. But through my research, I was able to find one photographer Alvaro Laiz and his project that caught my eye. In his project ‘Transmongolian’ Alvaro Laiz (Spain, 1981) depicts a world of solitude and crushed dreams within the Mongolian community of homosexuals and transgender.

This type of photography is know as documentary photography where the photographer chronicles both significant and historical events and everyday life. It is typically covered in professional photojournalism, or real life reportage, but it may also be an amateur, artistic, or academic pursuit. The photographer attempts to produce truthful, objective, and usually candid photography of a particular subject, most often pictures of people.

Alvaro Laiz's project depicts two parallel worlds, in terms of story and in terms of photography genre. One is made by order, magnificence of traditions and costumes which seems a stunning piece of art photography. The other is shot in documentary style, is hidden, sexual, real, made by night clubs, make up, transformation and solitude. The two worlds seem to be separated only by veiled curtains or the simple act of make-up removal in the transition from one world to the other. I feel that the artist is trying to juxtapose these two different worlds.

"Since I was very young I knew I wanted to dress like a girl. I felt I was a girl, but I was told I had to behave like a boy... and by that time I couldn´t understand why" Nyamka, 20 years old who lives in Ulaanbataar, Mongolia on his rented room.

The younger wrestle to flee the Mongolian borders, to countries such as the Philippines or Japan, where their 'condition' is much more tolerable and dreams of a sex change are attainable. Nyamka, 20 years old. 

Nurbul, professional dancer prepares himself for a private show on a gay party in Ulaanbataar 

Nurbul dressed as a mongolian queen

Nyamka, removes his make up and change his fem clothes on a taxi after her show on an underground party as her alter ego "Vanity". Men who dress like girls in public may suffer harrassment or phisical violence.

Since I was very young I knew I wanted to dress like a girl. I felt I was a girl, but I was told I had to behave like a boy... and by that time I couldn´t understand why" Nyamka, 20 years old who lives in Ulaanbataar, Mongolia on his rented room

Nyamka on a traditional mongolian queen costume

Sources: 
http://www.fotovisura.com/user/AlvaroLaizGarcia/view/transmongolian-2