shu lea cheang

Shu Lea Cheang is an experimental new media artist. She works with combinations of video, photography, and what she calls "net-based installation" art. Cheang's work often confronts different sociopolitical issues, primarily including ones of gender and sexuality. Her most prominent works belong to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and the Guggenheim collections.

This particular piece is called "Brandon." Cheang was commissioned by the Guggenheim to create this piece of new media art based on the life of Teena Brandon, a transsexual who, in 1993, was raped and murdered because of her sexuality. "Brandon" can be found here. The viewer first sees the image of a baby becoming a woman becoming a man, which is a literal allusion to Brandon's life. When the viewer, clicks on the morphing image, the curser can be moved around the screen to illustrate different images relating to transsexuality, and more specifically, Teen Brandon.

As the curser is dragged around the screen, the images continue to change. It is unsettling and the viewer feels confronted or targeted. Phrases from newspaper headlines like "she's a he," "killed for," "romance," "all," "exposure," and "rage" make the narrative undeniably human and from there common. That the viewer can relate to the art is what is most disturbing and sad about the way in which Cheang has portrayed Teena Brandon's tragedy.