‘I want to keep adding to the archive’: Conversations on hair, butch identity and repeating queer history

- Lydia Garnett

 

It’s no secret that shaved hair has long formed an important part of lesbian subcultures. The short-back-and-sides can be seen in early-mid 20th century butch/femme culture, but back then it played less of an important role in public activism against homophobia. From the '80s and '90s through to today, the shaved head has become political. More recently it’s been about gaining visibility and claiming space.

 

Photographer Lydia Garnett, curator Lucy Nurnberg and barbershop owner Zara Toppin recently came together to create and host the exhibition Close Shave to add to that archive. Shot in Zara’s barbershop, Toppins, Lydia tells me how they “always knew it would be a dyke series”. The idea first came about during a haircut, and from here was born a series of barber-themed portraits. For Lucy, the collection also “symbolizes that kind of balance between edge, tenderness… romance, all that.”

 

Using Lydia’s photographs as a starting point, we chat about the idea of using hair as self-expression, how we reference and repeat queer history, and why it’s important to document it.

 

Introduction and interview by Lucy Aldous.

 

 

So how did the collaboration between the three of you come about?

(Lydia)

Over the course of a haircut, we decided to do an exhibition in Sunbury Workshops. It’s been the perfect space really: a queer, barber, dyke-run space. We just had to find the perfect photos to show there.

 

(Zara)

I think the idea that when I’m there cutting someone’s hair it’s this very one-on-one experience, and then you have the same dynamic within the portraits…it made a lot of sense.

 

 

 

(Lydia)

I wanted it to be like that feeling of being in the barbershop and having people look at you while you’re sitting in the chair. Not that I’ve ever been to a traditional barbershop, but we kind of created that vibe in a very queer way. You have people looking at you, and you’re looking at them, and it’s all this sexy looking …

 

What do haircuts symbolise for you, especially given their historical context in the Butch experience? How does the exhibition explore this?

(Zara)

Throughout the process of the exhibition, Lydia shaved off their hair.

What made you do that?

(Lydia)

I just wanted to do it, exploring my butch identity I guess. I do that through all these portraits of fabulous butches, and queers, and people I admire… and realizing I can do that as well. It’s really interesting how you’re perceived when you have different hair, it’s just hair, but like, the world loses their shit when you have a different hair cut.

 

(Zara)

And I think the nice thing about the exhibition is that the hair cuts are incredibly varied, and all of the different identities within these ideas of dyke, butchness, transmasculinity… there’s such a huge range shown there under that umbrella. Even the way in which two people might wear a shaved head can be so different, you know?

 

 

 

(Lydia)

I think as well, you kind of communicate through hair cuts. What I love about this project is this kind of butch-on-butch, silent nods, it’s quite sexy in a way. You can read a lot about someone through their style and through their hair choices, even if it’s two quite different short hair cuts. With the choices you make, you communicate with the people you want to communicate to.

That’s why we do it, I think, you want to be seen by the people you admire and are attracted to.

 

 

 

 

 

Would you say haircuts can be liberating?

(Lucy)

It’s like the classic thing, you have a break up… or you’re having a change in life, so you get a great new haircut, it really is liberating. That process of transformation. I feel like changing your hair is so much bigger than aesthetics, or style, it’s so rooted in how we are perceived and how we perceive ourselves.

 

(Lydia)

There’s something about visibility as well. That’s what this exhibition offers. Sometimes you just want to be visible, and do your bit for the lesbian, dyke, butch community by just like… looking like a dyke. It’s as simple as that, I find that really affirming and reassuring and wonderful when I see other dykes…

The more short-haired dykes the better, to claim space in this straight world.

 

 

 

(Zara)

We love long-haired dykes too.

 

(Lydia)

Yeah, any dykes.

 

 

Lydia, you mentioned that Catherine Opie is a big source of inspiration for your work. I read that she felt she “needed to make work that reflected a nobility in relation to the queer body.” and that she “wanted to bring it back down to a human level”, as she hadn’t seen that before, or at least not enough. She also said that “the only way we can often know ourselves is by seeing ourselves”. How does this relate to how you use your camera lens to document?

 

(Lydia)

I love Catherine Opie’s work, the way it’s so honest and also the way it’s lit is very beautiful, so you feel there’s power being given to these subjects. I’d never really seen queer bodies presented in that way before, it’s very glamorous, gorgeous and uplifting. That’s why I wanted to shoot it in the studio with beautiful lighting, just to make people look and feel… I guess noble is a really good word, because there’s that power behind them, there’s that eye contact.

This thing about seeing ourselves is the reason we do a lot of this photography, this documentation, is because you’re documenting each other, and seeing ourselves. There’s not enough series like that really, of dyke, trans, portraiture.

 

 

 

(Lucy)

I was just thinking as well, there’s something really nice about how the work does feel referential, you made it very much with images by Catherine Opie in mind, and also the video that was documented, which is shot on 16mm film.

I feel as queer people we often repeat these tropes and stereotypes because we’ve been starved of representation and the history, the references that we have, we just love to like, repeat. It’s a code that we’re always reliving because it’s been denied (from) us. There’s something really beautiful whether it’s a haircut that a butch might have worn in Victorian times, or these photos series that are referencing each other, I just think it’s really nice that we’re repeating history, and keeping it alive.

 

(Lydia)

I want to keep adding to the archive of lesbian representation, because you never know when someone might stumble upon these pictures. So you have a responsibility for it to be good.

 

 

(Zara)

I think there is so much power in the fact that it’s a series. So many of these individual people, all sharing the same experience.

 

(Lydia)

I think it can just like, grow and grow, and we can keep doing it…

 

(Zara)

Until every lesbian has been covered!

 

(Lydia)

That’s the plan.

 

You said the haircut can be an act of self-love and care. Why do you think that? Is that something you experienced yourselves?

(Zara)

Maybe if you’re not buying into other feminine, traditional, beauty practices, you know that’s a huge generalization, but for myself, I’m not going to get a manicure, pedicure, or wax. So going to get a haircut is the practice. It’s the moment to be taken care of.

For myself, I’ve had to really think about how I want to present in the world, the ways I don't want to present as a female person … I’ve had to carefully think about what I do want to present as.

 

 

 

 

(Lydia)

You make these decisions based on what makes you feel good. You have to ignore other things, so it’s not easy. That’s why butch self-love is a triumphant thing because you’re really putting yourself first.

 

(Zara)

Yeah, and owning that creativity of self-presentation. The act of creating your identity for yourself.

 

(Lucy)

‘It’s so true that a lot of the classically ‘feminine’ self-care rituals do not apply to butch identity but I think the construct of butch identity does involve so much careful grooming, and curation, this sense of looking at yourself and how you’re presenting which is actually very tender, very intimate…

 

(Lydia)

That’s why everyone loves a butch.

 

 

 

 

Credits:

Close Shave by Lydia Garnett, Lucy Nurnberg and Zara Toppins

Photography: Lydia Garnett

Curator: Lucy Nurnberg

Barbershop owner: Zara Toppin

Text: Lucy Aldous

 

An archive submission HÄN received in January 2023 from Lydia Garnett.

 

24/01/2023