Niv Acosta is a classically trained dancer using that background to examine American black masculinity. Born to a Dominican mother and identifying as a queer trans man, Niv uses his personal and political identity to create performances that utilize personal writing, dance, and pop music.
Interviewer: Annie Malamet
Photographer: Yasmine Laraqui and Charles Roussel
A: Ok, so,. I know that you were originally a dancer. How did you come to performance art?
N: I think there’s a sort of…and I think this is a conversation that keeps coming up in dance, is that dance is beginning to lend itself to visual art. Not just conceptually but aesthetically I think a lot of people are thinking more and more about their aesthetics because there seems to be…I don’t know. People are more interested in being in non-conventional spaces and peroforming performing and also exploring different mediums because it just feels like a nice bridge. It’s a very organic bridge to go to. So performance art became how I was describing my art because it felt like dance was too limiting after a while, because I’m working not just with movement but conceptually with my political identity and how I’m interacting with society at large. For lack of a better term “performance art” is where I went. There’s limitations with any label.
A: Yeah, I mean your work is definitely more dance dance-heavy than other performance art.
N: Yeah my work is…I come from a dance background and that’s like what my work is, it’s dance. But because of the complex ideas that I’m working with, performance art is more lenient. I feel like, in performing in museums and working with and interacting with visual arts and being in the visual arts world, people are more accepting and able to talk,. Whereas whereas, with dance, there are so many things that are so fucking archaic and gendered and normative. It’s just in general, and not to say that dance is horrible, but in general it has a history of limitations.
A: Yeah, that’s understandable.
N: Yeah, so that’s how I came to describe my work as that.
A: So, I mean, you kind of just answered this. I just wanted to know: what do you feel is the influence of dance, like traditional dance, or any kind of dance background, on your artistic practice?
N: Well,. Just just like we all have some sort of childhood focus. – Like like we all either took music lessons or ballet or tap, or whatever it was. – I went to the Martha Graham school of contemporary dance in the city and was on scholarship there through most of High School, and Martha Graham had more codified techniques of modern dance, and it’s very old at this point. You know, she kind of started from this very feminist, – like this first-wave feminism- sort of getting into only only-women women-performing and being very powerful and empowered through their movement. And so, having that in my history, I feel like I am pulling from that in my work. Her work is extremely melodramatic, and I sort of play with that ironically in my work because I think that is really accessible to a dance audience. But obviously I don’t think you’d recognize my work as Graham Graham-influenced. Just that is my history and I’m using that as a vehicle to express [myself] in an accessible way, I guess. But yeah my training is like, ever present, because I’m conforming [to it] in my own work, and my body is my medium, and my body has this memory of all these things, so there’s no other way, : I can’t not have the history I have in my work, because it’s coming from me, and what [it] comes from me and it expresses what I’m interested in now but also what I used to be interested in when I was 17 years old.
A: Yeah, your work is very personal and confessional in a lot of ways but also politically driven.
N: Yeah.
A: So, you talk about this on your website, but I wanted you to tell me about the Denzel series. How did you start it, what are the main themes you’re working with, [and] why Denzel Washington? I read about it, but I wanted to hear it from you.
N: Yeah, we can talk about it. So, when I was starting to choreograph again, which was in 2009/2010, I had taken a 2 year hiatus from directing or creating anything, because I had a really traumatic experience at Cal Arts, so I needed to find out if that’s what I actually wanted to do. So I took 2 years off, and I kind of came back to creating work with [just]really wanting to be present and honest about my needs. And not just my needs like: “I need bread;” but: “I need to feel safe in my working environment;.” Or or: “I need to express myself always.” “I need to be present while I’m performing.” I was sort of addressing all these needs that I hadn’t really learned to express previously. So, when I started the Denzel series, I started with a solo. They were called Denzel and Denzel Prelude. it It was a two two-part solo. And i[I]nitially, I had watched the trailer of Glory (the film with Matthew Broderick and Morgan Freeman and Denzel Washington). And and I was like…… really enchanted by how rhythmic the movement [was]s throughout….. I think this movie premiered in the 80’s or early 90’s… and And there’s like, a melody or a rhythm to how it’s shot… literally. But also the music, : they were using this classical piece called O Fortuna, which uses a choir of singers, and it’s and VERY dramatic. And so having the image of Matthew Broderick and Morgan Freeman and Denzel Washington, and then also knowing the context of the story, – I don’t know if you know it, – but it has to do with the civil war and having these newly freed slaves come and fight at the front lines at Fort Hamilton. Like pretty much untrained, [they] just gave them a gun and put them on the front lines. Which, in and of itself historically, is like so shitty and so sad. And I was in a very dark place at that time…
A: So it was speaking to you.
N: Exactly! That’s what I wanted to talk about and what I wanted to think about. So it started out as being able to relate to the story. But also starting to get more specific, I was grappling with my own gender identity at that time, and really coming into owning my masculine identity and have [having] that be present in my work and not have [having] that be a statement about masculinity necessarily. Like, indirectly it’s about everything, but it actually comes from my interest in black masculinity and how that’s represented in the media. And Denzel being this sort of archetype, and Morgan Freeman, : like all …black male actors that are doing well, are constantly type type-casted. And in that way the film industry is so behind, like I wish so much…… not to say that there aren’t people who are trying to do that[reverse that kind of type-casting]. Like fucking Orange is the New Black, we haven’t gotten that far.
A: Yeah.
N: So thinking about how people see black men and black masculinity, and feeling sort of distraught, as if my identity as a black, male-identified person was doomed to fail or [be] type type-casted or ostracized. To be the other always and forever. So grappling with that in the work, I guess I also starting start[ed] to get down with my femininity at the same time. Like I had finally started to practice voguing, which I had always been really obsessed with and grew [growing] up in the community. And I started to incorporate that into my movement practice. So Denzel- ever since day one- has always been about gender and gender representation, but also black masculinity and how that feels really diverse and outside of what is being projected onto my body as someone who is [masculine masculine-identityidentified]. I mean my work is… the Denzel series is very personal, as you were saying. I work with family, I work with friends, with people I trust and know and love, and that feels very important to the Denzel process as well.
A: Yeah, you were just talking about voguing…and I read on your website that you want to incorporate voguing and throwing shade [into your work]. And you talk a lot about black masculinity, but I notice that- you know, [extrapolating] from my (granted) limited knowledge, – voguing and shade comes from queer black masculinity. So can you speak to that identity?
N: Sure. Whose identity you mean, mine or…? …?
A: Yeah, like how that plays into the idneity identity that you’re trying to create in the piece.
N: Sure, yeah.
A: …Because I feel like there is, in the larger culture, theres straight masculinity and queer masculinity, and they overlap, but Denzel is this sort of straight, male icon, but the voguing is this tradition that’s rooted in the queer community. How do you see those two things connecting?
N: Yeah, I think those two things don’t feel separate to me. I identify as queer, and I don’t know. … I guess my access point to voguing is by having lived inside that community, being raised in that community. My mom is HIV HIV-positive and pretty much all of our holiday parties were with… not to say that we’re all family, but we have a lot of friends that are queer men of color and are voguers and would have voguing competitions. or Or they’d come over for holiday parties and we’d all hang out, and you know, have a kiki. And in the HIV/AIDS community that’s sort of what is ever present, which is queer men of color. And then, like, my mom, and a few other female female-idenitified people, including trans women. And they’re all people of color. I don’t think I ever really met anything other than that. So I have a deep affinity for that community and feel tied to it. It feels like a part of me. Having- after so many years, – being Dominican and having a deeply embedded racism towards being dark skinned, hating myself for being dark skinned;. aAnd then in my 20’s, coming out of the closet as black and OWNING owning it, and being happy about it, and seeing that I’m awesome because of it… and there is nothing wrong with that.
A: So it’s kind of almost an act of embracing that part of who you are.
N: Yeah that part of my identity. And you know, it’s hard too you know because, I grew up Dominican, and that’s Hispanic culture. However, walking through the world, I am black. People think I’m mixed race, half black half white, or whatever it is, I’m still black and that’s how I’m going to be treated. And going to a predominantly black high school and being called an Oreo or a coconut because I wasn’t from the “hood” or spoke “hood” or whatever it is…that always made me feel disconnected from other people who were my color. And finally having [I have] the distance and time and lack of angst to get over that and accept that part of myself as something that was beautiful and empowering. So coming back to my work, being queer queer-idenitified identified and also seeing black masculinity represented in media as mostly heterosexual. Like when there’s a black gay man represented its mostly for comedic relief.
A: Totally.
N: It’s always some sort of funny minstrel minstrel-type character. I’m not saying that Denzel is my role model through this. I feel like, if anything, I’m challenging the presence of that[him], or Morgan Freeman or any of them, as an archetype. As people they’re probably awesome, you know what I mean? But I’m directly confronting how people project onto their bodies.
A: Using stereotypes to reconcile your own identity.
N: Exactly. Appropriating stereotypes.
A: Yeah better word. (laughing) So how many incarnations of this piece have there been?
N: There are now six.
A: Wow that’s cool. I like how you just keep going.
N: Yeah (laughing)
A: Yeah I watched every video on your website. I noticed there’s subtle changes, I can see the trajectory. Is all of the dancing improvised?
N: Um, that is a great question. Most….certainly (both laughing). However, I like to work with a structured improvisation in most of my work. There are landmarks and to me, it’s a conversation with myself. I think there are moments of deep structure in my work. There’s a section in denzel minipetite b a t h t u b happymeal…where the piece is mostly just speaking and then there’s movement. There’s a lot of speaking going on and movement feels secondary to that. I think what’s interesting about that piece is that it is very structured because it’s bookended by text. Text that is very scripted and written down and meant to be performed the same exact way each time. But then I have this[the improvised piece], and I like to have the tensions of many choices during a live performance. I’m working with a few landmarks. Not very hard landmarks, but certainly ones that feel important to the work or what I’m trying to convey. The progression feels mapped. However, there’s a sort of freedom in how we approach it as performers.
A: I noticed in one of the videos one of the performers says “Opulence- you own everything.” And I know that that’s from Paris is Burning.
N: Yeah it is.
A: And you also read text at the beginning. Is that your writing? What you feel is the role of prose in your work? Are these letters to Denzel?
N: So… I’ve written so many letters to Denzel. Not the person, but the character I’m developing. And in that piece, denzel b a t h t u b, that was a letter to Denzel from me, the director of the work. I’m kind of explaining my obsession/love and hate relationship to the idea of Denzel. But also… we’re in love. It’s such a complex relationship that will ebb and flow forever. I go deep into how it’s intertwined in my won own life. It’s biographical, ; it isn’t just talking about this mythical character I’ve created. I’m really leaking in my own personal things about how I see work, how I see myself in work, how I feel when I’m performing. I did write that. Almost all the text I wrote except for a few appropriating passages.
A: What about the “your ass looks like an overgrown orangutan” line? Is that yours? (laughing)
N: Um… I’m trying to think. “Orangutan”… that sentiment comes from Paris is Burning directly, I think. I forget her name. She’s very fair and has blonde hair.
A: Oh is that the woman who was murdered afterwards? I think her name was Venus.[1]
N: I don’t remember. But yeah she says something like… this was a moment of throwing shade, and she says something along the lines of “orangutan.” So I just took “orangutan” and put it into my own list of words, my own sentence. That comes from me and her. We collaborated on that one (laughing).
A: So why the bathtub?
N: why Why the bathtub… that’s a great question. So denzel b a t h t u b started as a five five-minute party piece. We we created for a party called “Aunts.” And this was at a loft in Bushwick called “The Secret Loft.”
A: I feel like I know that party.
N: It’s a performance party so there are multiple performances happening in the space in a two-hour span. Which can feel like craziness but can also be like this awesome, euphoric like “whoa everything is happening all the time.” And you definitely have to make choices as someone who is witnessing all of it. Cason Bolton, who is in the bathtub with me, : we were rehearsing in my bathtub in the bathroom where I was living in East Flatbush, because the acoustics were good. And I was recording it for my own archival purposes, and we had done so many rehearsals sitting inside the bathtub. And we got invited do the “Aunts” thing, and I knew that had an actual claw foot bathtub in the space, so I was like “how would you feel about doing this in an actual bathtub?” Everything about denzel b a t h t u b feels watery to me. It feels like there’s some sort of underwater like… nature to the language, to the movement that I ended up creating out of the party piece. It’s interesting to me to use a bathtub because that felt transparent about the process, and that to me feels really true to the denzel process. I don’t know, I prefer to be transparent about these things. We got so comfortable rehearsing it in a bathtub that it felt like second nature to actually do it in a bathtub.
We had a performance at BAX where we used a baby bathtub, where we just put our feet in because that’s all we could fit in it. At the Dancespace Project show, we had a half bathtub that my friend, Nico, built. There’s also this tension, because we’re throwing shade at each other, with each other, in this very confined space. I enjoyed just having that aesthetic tension. Like, you’re trapped inside of that tub and you’re saying “I’m a ruin you cunt” into this person’s ear repeatedly and very aggressively (laughing). So I haven’t quite dissolved what that has meant to me, but I think that goes without saying that it speaks to the confinement of being who we are, you know what I mean? But still having to work it out and being resilient to it.
A: I guess there’s also that whole baptism iconography going on.
N: Interesting!
A: That’s what I thought when I saw the bathtub I was like “baptism!”
N: (laughing) that’s That’s very interesting. I hadn’t thought of that.
A: It’s always interesting to take to an artist what you think they’re saying.
N: Yeah I hadn’t heard that.
A: Yeah and they’re like “I didn’t think about that!” Um…so music is obviously very important to the performances. How does pop music and classical music figure into it? Like I know “I’m a ruin you cunt” is from Azealia Banks and you use her in two of the incarnations. What do you feel is the significance of music?
N: It’s funny: I got asked to describe denzel in a few words to a curator, because she was just trying to get like a blip of it. And it came down to “Denzel the Musical.” Because there’s a monologue, and then there’s a dialogue, and there’s singing and dancing. To me, and in my history and in my bodily history, music is extremely important and generative. I feel like my approach with my music in my work is a social comment using pop music, because I do believe Bach is pop. Everyone can recognize Bach, most people can at this point. It feels like, not separate. Using Bach, and then using Azealia Banks in b a t h t u b, feels like opposite ends of the same spectrum, for lack of a better term. I am voguing while Bach is playing. I’m doing a loose voguing structure and in that piece I’m playing with failure. I’m failing at voguing, or failing at being erect. I’m constantly or never really steady. And when I am its very much noticing the audience gaze as a performer, just siting there and watching people watch me is a part of that solo, is a part of that movement. And that’s the only moment where I become still, because it’s sort of a reckoning with being watched. And it’s also a message from me to the audience, like this is for me, this is not for you. This is mine, and I made it. This is my body.
A: It’s interesting that you say that, because I had a question about your work being Metameta. Oh god I worded it so much better [before], let me find it… Ok, so your performances are often Meta meta and pretty self-aware. How is breaking the fourth wall important to the message of your art?
N: I think that for me as an artist, a young artist, in this time, dealing with the ideas that I’m dealing with, which are huge questions of race, and blackness, and gender, and genderqueer identity, and queerness, and class, and sexism-, whatever it is, all the things, – I would like to always feel, as an audience member when I see work, to feel accountable for what I’m projecting onto the performance. And why is it that I think this [is] about whatever it is, or why is it that I think these things, and ask myself those questions. And so, as someone who’s creating work, [I’m] kind of demanding that of my audience. I’m not trying to put anyone through it as some sort of joke., this This is not a joke. This is my life., this This is our life. You’ve paid to come sit down and watch me do this thing. I need it to feel safe, so to me breaking the fourth wall is extremely important because we’re all in this together. The audience is just as equally important to the work as the work itself.
That’s something that you know, purely because of evolution, is important, too for a lot of other artists in my generation. Sort of breaking that barrier;, feeling like you are behind a glass case is so oppressive. I think the intentionality behind it, where you’re commenting [on] the fourth wall, that I kind of swing between with denzel. I try not to always bee challenging and confrontational with my audience as a performer, but I think that my gazgaze [ing] out to people when I’m performing is how I make myself feel comfortable, but also I’m like…guys, I see you. You’re there, . we’re We’re here together.
A: Your gaze is challenging. But there’s also maybe something comedic about what you’re doing. I wanted to ask you: how important is comedy, and making people laugh. ?
N: Hm, interesting.
A: …Because when you’re throwing shade its very funny. And I don’t know…I guess I just wanted to hear your thoughts about that.
N: I think that most people laugh out of discomfort.
A: That’s a good point.
N: Most people laugh out of discomfort. When its kind of unknown or unfamiliar, people are like “ah heh heh” (imitating nervous laughter). You know? The quiver laugh. Because its unfamiliar or they want to get it…they think because of the way its being delivered this must be comedic this must be something that’s humorous, so lets all laugh now. But also it’s kind of sad. It’s deeply sullen.
A: Oh yeah its definitely not “ha ha” funny.
N: No it’s not at all.
A: It’s uncomfortable.
N: Yeah it’s uncomfortable. People laugh out of that. I don’t actually intentionally work with humor in my work. I think people laugh out of discomfort. The video of the performance at BAX is kind of an intense thing. When I performed it and finished it, I felt so wrong. It was one of the better performances of that piece but as the main performer in the work, and having essentially splayed out all of these feelings in the work, I felt like of course it was poetic, but that’s my own version of performative writing. To have people laugh at the moments that they did was kind of like…oh my god. Why was that funny? Is it funny because I have a big booty? Is it funny because I’m looking at you in a way that feels uncomfortable and so that must be trying to make you laugh? What’s so funny about being on rhythm? You know what I mean? To me, the joke is between Cason and I. the The joke is not anybody else’s. It’s a very intimate feeling, being involved in that banter that he and I are engaged with. And that piece is very intimate, . Wwe created that together, alone, . we We trust each other., we We love each other, [and] that can never exist outside that relationship. Having people laugh in those moments was you know, like sometimes satisfying because there were moments where I was like, “Ook you can laugh now,.” But but other moments I was like, “ok Ok just think about it. Instead of laughing, just think about why that’s funny.”
A: I know that feeling. That’s what happens whenever you make work that’s uncomfortable.
N: Yeah it’s interesting when it’s been such a private process and you present it to people and there’s a moment you didn’t was funny.
A: But you do a very good job of keeping focus. But I was wondering like, “people People are laughing. I feel like I should ask about that.”
N: It’s a really good question.
A: So when you did denzel again, the piece with your mother, I was almost crying because it really touched me. It was a visceral reaction because I only watched it once. I’d have to watch it again to absorb everything. But there was this sweetness that you have between each other. I felt like… “ok Ok I know what he’s talking about.”
N: That’s cool!
A: Yeah I felt like really like… “this This is some heavy shit.” (both laughing) What do you feel is the significance of collaboration in your work?
N: Oh this is a good one. Collaboration is such a tricky term because I think that in essence, how I think about collaboration is [as] something that is equal parts everybody’s to own. I don’t feel like I work collaboratively. I’m extremely decisive about my work.
A: Yeah it almost feels like you’re using actors.
N: Yeah, which is interesting, its funny to put my mom in a work where I’m being so much the director. That was a fun rehearsal process (laughing).
A: Your mom is so cute by the way.
N: Yeah she’s going to be in the next piece at NYLA (New York Live Arts). So I don’t [usually] identify my work as deep collaborations- except there are moments. Like the text that Kayson and I developed- that was Kayson and I, that was the only part in the piece where it was somewhat of a collaboration. I still take ownership over the prompt, I still take ownership of the aesthetic. It’s very much that my feet and hands are in everything. So very much how it is presented is mine. And I have no shame about that because I feel like the people I’m bringing in are a part of my identity. They fall in line with who I am and how I present myself in my work, and how I talk about my work. That’s not to say they don’t have their own identities, and how they perform is completely theirs, and that is awesome. I prefer that variable. That’s why I work with an improvisational structure.
I recently did a collaboration with somebody. “Collaboration” in air quotes. I recently choreographed this project from somebody that was a video project. And it wasn’t mine… . I wouldn’t tell anybody to go see it. I wouldn’t tell anybody to go see it and say[saying], “tThis is mine.” It has nothing to do with how I work, . Iit’s very much aesthetically not mine. I chipped in. I chipped into the pot. And I get credit for that you know, I got paid. It isn’t mine to say that it is mine. But it’s cool that we get the opportunities we get with this work. We get to maybe go show it in a museum in Amsterdam.
A: That’s great.
N: Yeah. That’ll be the first time, which is hilarious, the first time my work is traveling. But is it my work? Collaboration is tricky because I think that its possible to have a collaboration but really I don’t know that I am capable, particularly within the denzel series, capable of collaborating with such a deep way where I can comfortably give someone else ownership of a part of the work. You know what I mean?
A: Yeah, that makes sense.
N: …Which might seem shitty to some people, but I mean…
A: No, I totally get it.
N: I’m definitely reckoning with a lot of control issues. But I can also gladly say that it is all mine. When it gets down to labeling it, like: “nNo, that was my idea. I wrote that. I sang that. I made the costumes.”
A: So, kind of going back to the dancing aspect, there was one more question I wanted to ask. To play with gender, do you purposefully use feminine movements versus masculine movements? Or are you trying to keep it more universal?
N: As far as gender and movement, that’s always a big ass question because, what is masculine and what is feminine? I don’t k know that it’s that black and white ever for myself or with my body. I don’t identify as a bro, and if that’s what masculine is then I don’t identify that way. But I know I’m masculine because people project that onto me. I have short hair, I have a deep voice, and I wear men’s clothing, gender- assigned men’s clothing. I think that movement is so much more fluid than that. I don’t think you can gender movement. I don’t think you can gender how people posture and hold themselves. I think it’s really violent to have that expectation on people’s bodies, especially in dance when you use your body as a medium. I guess I’m a pretty a effeminate man and I’m really proud of that. Yes, I was socialized as female and that feels like a part of me. I can’t just up and be like “nah I’m gonna hunch my shoulders all the time and be MEAN and grow a mustache” (laughing). I’m not interested in that. I have done so much work to get the point of identifying as transgender, that I don’t want to work any harder to be who I am.
A: And knowing, “jJust because I’m trans doesn’t mean I have to be a macho stereotype.” Like, it’s valid for cis men to be effeminate, so why not a trans man?
N: Yeah, this is what I mean. For a while I was identifying as a gay man. Specifically a gay man because at that time I’d wrapped my head around the idea that that was the only way to be effeminate and identify and as male. And no, I can comfortablye identify as a queer man and that feels like just enough. Cause words are words, words are so limiting. If we need to use words, that’s what I would describe myself as. But yeah, there’s no need to make me not do a split because I’m a man. Whatever it is, I try to lose myself in that when I’m peroforming and improvising, because there was a time when I was really concerned with that, and angry. I swing between being like a mana-minotoaur, or a wood elf, or a fairy or a queen. That’s what was so interesting about the vogue ball scene was you could sort of like, for those moments, live in any character you want and be versatile. And that feels comfortable to me. I don’t want to be any one thing to anybody or to myself. That’s what makes so much sense for me with that kind of movement, with voguing and the voguing culture. If I had to identify myself in that context I do identify as a Butch Queen and that feels… awesome.
A: So my standard last question, : plans for the future? When is your next performance?
N: Right now I’m in the process of getting my act together, which is means not being the only administrator of my work. Bringing on a couple of people to help with fundraising and managing everything else that I can’t. I can’t do that anymore by myself because the work load has gotten so big. I’m performing in LA at Human Resources in October.
A: It sounds like you’re really getting your work out there. It’s getting traction.
N: Yes it is, which feels enormous and I honestly feel so privileged to have access to so many things now. So yeah I have that performance in LA. I’m also performing with someone else, Vanessa Anspaugh, right now and will be performing with her in the winter of next year. So the order is: October, LA;. January I have an APAP at NYLA; and a week and a half later I’ll have my split show there with Tess Dworman.
So yeah, my show dates at NYLA are January 30th, 31st, and February 1st. Things are still working themselves out but at least three performances [are] coming in the new year.
Website: www.nivacosta.com
APAP conference: http://www.apapnyc.org/
[1] Full name is Venus Xtravaganza.
