Perpetuated by cultural fictions and tenuous historical guidelines, we collectively perform gender to avoid the repercussions of stepping outside of society’s sexual norms. One of the more crucial components of this performance is what we wear. Our appearance communicates a wordless exchange silently empowering us to proclaim our allegiances, both what we value personally as well as what aspects of society/culture we associate with. By changing and transforming the traditional costumes, I wish to challenge their ingrained gendered meanings. I want to step outside of our polarized conception of gender, to minimize, decenter, and destabilize the typical gendered script.

My current project utilizes customary Kuwaiti garments. Manipulating and reshaping their forms, I create female garments by deconstructing male ones. The combined garments break self-presentational gender binaries by blending them, creating singular garments that supersede masculinity and femininity. However, my work is not limited to the garments themselves. I wear the garments, photographing myself within them and staging performances in both the public and private realms.