the importance of being whimsical

The first time I heard the phrase ‘weaponised whimsy’ was as a comment from a fabulous theatre director, Sarah chew while working on a play called lipstick a fairytale of Iran.

The story follows the green uprising in Iran and contains a lot of difficult subject matter. To counter this, the storytelling utilised a lot of humour, playfulness and surrealism.

‘when all ammunition is taken from us, the only thing left is to Weaponise Whimsy’,

The phrase stuck with me, probably due to how it was presented as an aside, but an important one. The concept so perfectly explained the complexity of the impact of the play that I continued to think about the place of whimsy as a storytelling method during the coming months. over time, I began, subconsciously and then consciously, incorporating it into my artistic practice.

whimsy /ˈwɪmzi/  noun

noun: whimsy; noun: whimsey

1.     playfully quaint or fanciful behaviour or humour.

2.   a thing that is fanciful or odd.

Many people who embrace the concept of whimsy have what could be considered fragmented storylines. These fragmented memories and histories create complex, separate narrative moments and personalities without consistency. These stolen moments tend to sit more alive than the current situation, existing in technicolour, while the present moment exists in black at white.

Countering this fragmentation, creating new, fleeting ‘tableaus’ of surrealism, at once essential and irreverent, allow us to take control of the pieces and make a more consistent whole. This instantaneous and temporary development of surrealist realities and personalities allows our chameleon-like adaptability to take centre stage, presenting an escape from any situation that makes us uncomfortable via humour and confusion.

For those of us who have lived through traumatic sub-plots and twists in our lives, whimsy allows us almost mystical control over our own wounded storytelling. Turning the horror, not necessarily into beauty, but into something absurd, odd, ‘other’ allows the complete jurisdiction of the construction of this ‘othering, something both done to us by the world, and by ourselves.weaponise /ˈwɛpənʌɪz/ verb

verb: weaponise

1.     adapt for use as a weapon.
2.     install weapons in.
"critics see this effort to weaponise space as profoundly dangerous for national security"

The concept of weaponising for radical transformation comes from the mirror effect felt by others experiencing this full force of surrealism and is one that Queer activists have utilized over the years. One cannot become this ‘other’ without projecting the viewer's own ‘otherness’ in the process. the notion of surrealism and humour being used to highlight the flaws in another’s argument or assumptions of normality has a long history. Oscar Wilde was probably the master talent in this. as was Quentin Crisp. These ‘tricksters’ created their own narratives, personas, and worlds and asked those around them to join them on their flamboyant adventures. Many Queer people utilise this technique as they, by default, have grown up with an element of trauma and restriction of the ‘self’. Actively choosing to ‘queer’ oneself to the casual viewer allows some level of un-detection. The more ‘other’ one is, the less likely people are to see themselves in the mirror – and the less likely they are to punch you for the things in themselves they don’t like.

There is a suggestion with the phrase whimsy that it is somewhat silly and childish, that it mostly harks back to childish things we should at once put to bed and grow out of. But the power of whimsy is that it sits firmly within the ‘moral forming’ power of fairy stories and fable narratives, embedded so deep within us that we have forgotten that they once formed us. Whimsy reminds us of parenting, of safety and the fear of the unknown, sitting heavily alongside the trust that we will, in fact, find out way back home.

The codifiers in these playful narratives are the clues that allow us to traverse our way home while dealing with the confusion of the surrealism of the story, the image, or the character. Whimsy is, by its nature, intrinsically Queer and allows us to explore concepts that society finds confronting from a position of apparent safety.