Secret Bolo

Lu Valena

Interview by C. VanWinkle

You started Bait/Switch and have been running the show for years, and now you got to contribute for the first time! How did it feel to finally get to play your own game?

It felt amazing! And it felt so different from how I expected it to feel. It really did. It surprised me. I didn’t think it would, but it really did.

I’m so glad to hear that! Now can you begin by describing what it was that you responded to?

Yes. I responded to a poem. It was a really cool poem, and very apropos of my life for sure. I think that really what I was getting from it was this idea that dissociation is a survival mechanism that a lot of us use all the time, especially right now during covid time. There’s just a lot of that happening. And what would it mean to actually display that and show it to other people rather than pretending they were not doing it?

What was your first impression? Did you relate to it immediately?

I did. I read through it, I printed it out, I read through it a few more times. I right away did a little free write while it was super fresh, and did some bizarre little sketches. My first thought about it was about this concept in there called Turtle Sam. It was the author’s turtle version of themself. I realized that my version of Turtle Sam would be Snail Lu because snails are a big deal for me. I love snails. I don’t connect with turtles as much, but I definitely can think about a snail version of myself. I went down a little research rabbit hole about snails, which was really funny. And weird.

What happened next?

There was something else that came out of my little free write that was pretty cool. This is some astrological stuff. One interesting feature of my birth chart, which is not the best arrangement, is my sun sign is in my 12th house. The 12th house is the house of shadow. What’s interesting about that, for me, is that my inner light is somehow most comfortable shining from this extremely dark place, that’s sort of hidden in this way. So this idea of putting your dissociation on display really triggered something about that for me, because what’s the thing that I would prefer to hide? And how could I actually embrace it and put it on display? Connected to that, I wrote this line: The deepest secrets aren’t secret at all. That’s something that I’ve realized about myself recently, but I hadn’t actually been able to put it into words that way. I’ve found that the things that seem like the most intense, deepest, darkest, hardest secrets for me to wrestle with are right in front of my face. They’re not secret. They’re right there! I just have to turn my head a little bit to see them. It’s not something I actually need to excavate. There’s just a lot blocking my view, like right here.

These are secrets that are not secret at all, just to you? Are you talking about what other people see in you?

I think that sometimes other people can see them and I can’t. It was really funny to me when I came out as non-binary. There were a lot of people who were like, “Oh yeah, I think I knew this about you”. And I was like, “Well I didn’t! No one gave me the memo!” Things like that. And I think that it’s true for someone personally, but I think the same thing is true of our culture also. I think there are a lot of things about late-stage capitalism where these things are not actually secret; we would just prefer not to look over there. We would prefer not to look at the idea that our entire way of life is built on this really unsustainable model. We live in this illusion with all of this stuff that’s all built on oil. And we’re past the peak of oil usage. I think that was the other thing that I was thinking about.

I’m going to change gears here. I know you to be a person who makes garments: shirt, jackets pants. Have you made many accessories before? I feel like this is new territory.

It was. I make all of my own clothes and I have for years, which is one of those weird things about me that I don’t really talk about much. I think it freaks people out, actually. They just don’t really know what to do with that information. And yeah, I haven’t really made accessories. I don’t think I’ve ever made jewelry. The only thing that I’ve made that’s remotely similar to this is when I contributed to the Adventure Calendar, I made a keychain. But that’s very different from what I made for this for sure.

I feel like this is new territory for Bait/Switch also. Are you Bait/Switch’s first haberdasher?

I don’t really know what the word for it is. I like haberdasher, but it’s not a hat.

I looked it up. It looks like milliners make hats, and haberdashers make “accessories”, which can include hats.

What?? That’s the best news! That really makes me want to just change careers completely. If I could be a haberdasher, then forget it. I now know my entire life trajectory.

And now you definitely need new business cards. So what led you to decide to make a tie?

I think that, right off the bat, the idea of putting your dissociation on display really spoke to me of something that had to be worn, had to be a wearable thing. At first, I thought that maybe it would be a locket. And you know, I have a couple of lockets and I love them, but I don’t really wear them because I’m not really a necklace wearer. I never have been. And I may wear even less jewelry now than when I identified as a woman. So I was trying to figure out how to make that jive. I’ve been really into seeing bolo ties on people, and like brooches, when people wear brooches at the throat sometimes. That whole zone, that between-the-lapels zone, is a pretty sweet spot for accessorizing. That’s something I noticed the most recent time we watched Twin Peaks. Jerry is always wearing the most amazing neckwear. It’s really hot.

Actually, something else that’s exciting to me about bolo ties is how they seem to be becoming more and more a part of queer fashion. That’s not something that I have really leaned into myself, so it was sort of exciting to make something that really neatly falls into that category right now in 2021.

That’s great! You said that you’re wearing jewelry less since you’ve embraced being non-binary. Maybe you just didn’t have the right jewelry.

My glam phase is beginning!

What about the shape of the thing? What led you there?

When I was doing my snail research, there were a couple of different types of snails that came along. The one that I ended up going with is a murex snail, which was actually one of the first things I got a research crush on when I was in middle school. It was my first research project that really made me want to dive in and keep going. My first experience of that was researching the Phoenicians. I was just totally smitten with these colors, you know, the wildness of it all! There were these boats that were carved with animals, and they had these triangular purple sails and it was on this blue water. The whole thing just totally spoke to me when I was 12. I was just fascinated. I remembered reading that the purple came from this murex snail shell. And then I looked that up and was like, What the fuck? It looks like that?? I really cherish remembering what that felt like. Now that happens to me all the time, but that was one of those first moments. I mean, I love research. I love digging into stuff and I love being like, Wait what? It’s this?? Anyway, that’s what murex shells look like. They’re really spiny and they are just absolutely gorgeous. They’re not gold, unfortunately. But the purple that Phoenicians used to signify royalty, and that continues to be associated with royalty, comes from the rectum of the murex.

That is great! And you were so moved by this, that that needed to be the totem or centerpiece of your tie?

Yeah. I felt that if we’re going for “putting it on display”, let’s go all the way. That was my feeling. I also wanted something that had a regality, you know, really owning whatever these darkest secrets are. The ones that I haven’t uncovered yet, that are apparently obvious to everyone else. Let this piece be the crowning glory of those secrets.

That’s so empowering. Are you going to wear it?

Yes. Yes I am. I don’t know when. It’ll have to be a special occasion.

Do you think you might make more things like this? Did you love it?

I did love it. Yeah, it was really a fun process. I made it on a wire armature with two types of clay: a polymer clay and the spikes were an epoxy clay. It ended up being pretty lightweight. It was really fun. And I love an excuse to gold leaf anything, really.

How does this piece relate to the rest of your work?

You know, this piece is totally different from anything else. I think it is. It is way out of left field. It was funny, I actually showed a friend the other day and she was just like, Oh are you entering your Dali phase of absurd objects? I was like, Maybe. Finally. I’ve been waiting for this.

I’m pretty excited to see where this goes! Do you have any advice for someone else approaching this project for the first time?

Just let go, let go into the process and allow it to just develop however it’s going to develop. I got really into the idea of a little curly snail shell for a while, and I was really fixated on that and trying to figure out how to make that work. I just couldn’t figure out how to make it work because I realized it wasn’t something I wanted to wear. I did not want to wear something with a big curly shell. And I realized that that was an important part of it for me. So it was fun to just allow it to change.

Call Number: C53PP | C56VA.vaSe

Lu Valena (they/them) is an artist, researcher, and consultant whose work explores concepts of expansion, the space in between, and the role of narrative in unexpected places. In recent years, their artwork has appeared at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, the Shelter in Place Gallery, the Visionary Art Collective, and Level99. They live in Jamaica Plain, MA.