Riding West on a Walrus Tail

Riding West on a Walrus Tail, commission for Leeds Museum in collaboration with West Yorkshire Queer Stories is a queer fairytale performed by members of the LGBTQIA+ community in West Yorkshire. The multiscreen installation is brought to life by an array of real-life performers from West Yorkshires only gay choir to its only transgender owned and run automobile shop. Using method acting techniques, participants explore their reality to bring characters to life. The semi-autobiographical, semi-fictional narratives echo the fluidity of identities as my collaborators live and imagine them. West Yorkshire’s rural and industrial communities are known for their proud, patriarchal and traditionally conservative culture. Yet queerness very much exists and thrives. The film chronicles the bizarre, telling the tales of those who until now have been hidden in plain sight.