Bloom

Set to the lilting tones of Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrongs honeyed rasp Bloom is a queer African pole dancers surreal adaptation of Shakespeares A Midsummer Nights Dream inspired by Ballet Blacks production A Dream Within a Midsummer Nights Dream Filmed against a scene of glossy anthuriums and fluorescent birds of paradise a vibrant bouquet dissolves revealing a portrait of an African body wreathed on a steel pole in various states of limbo an analogy for queerness itself In a state of nature pole dance like queerness is innocent However stigma attaches a perceived and misconceived immorality Through a system of prisms and mirrors attention is first drawn to an anthuriums spikeshaped inflorescence which bears small flowers with perfect male and female parts Focus then shifts to a pole in perspective superimposed against the lingering red silhouette of an anthuriums queer premise the desire to be