I am lying on a mattress in the middle of a room full of people, I feel tired and I am not sure of how my body can take more, more of anything, more of people, of walking, and talking, and fucking and eating and getting inspired and working and kissing and dancing and pain and pleasure and here I am taking more of everything. Breathing. Calmly.
I am so tired and I only now realise it as Shine is calling my attention back by asking what my pronouns are. What a bizarre question, I think; no one outside of the sex positive and queer communities has ever asked me that question. I also think that of all the questions I could be asked right now, this seems the most bizarre, and I don’t know why, it’s not like Marcus and I are doing some sort of a butterfly position discussing its benefits.
Oh, they them I say and the workshop carries on, and I am still in Marcus’ arms and I feel safe and also horny and it’s nice that I don’t have to hide it but I don’t have to act on it either.
I remember about my life only a few months ago, when everything was shit and I didn’t know how to pull it through but I knew that I was not going to repress my sexuality anymore, and sometimes I would channel that into work, some other times I’d just make sure I had the right people around me (behind below above inside me). So here I am. Breathing. Calmly. It’s my first Berlin P*rn Film Festival and I don’t have to hide who I am, what’s my job, why I do this and, most importantly, why I like it.
The day before, Hoss and I attend a networking event, which is always terrifying for me unless I have three gin tonics in my system, I have coffee and cigarettes instead, hm, wise. We all sit in a big circle, each person talks one at a time and when the microphone is in my hand I forget what I wanted to say or why it’s actually so important for me to share my work. I say that I am a filmmaker and sex performer, I say that I am a writer too, I mention sexual exploration and my ways of processing abuse, and I feel upset because I don’t want abuse to define my work. And it doesn’t. It’s ok. I want to help people and the only way to do it is to expose myself one step at a time.
When the presentations are over, a woman named Bambi (Biche De Ville) comes to me and says that she can relate to what I said, which is interesting to me because I don’t remember everything I said. She gives me a flayer with the code to access and watch her film, and I watch it few days later and I find myself sobbing because it’s so beautiful and I see what she saw in me and I understand her poetry and why sex is so fucking liberating and the darker it gets the freer we become.
I feel like I am not alone.
The night before that event, me and Hoss go to Moviemento and watch Nadia Granados and Amber Bemak’s work. Super dislocating, my brain is tripping between horniness and that uncomfortable feeling under the skin... Sometimes I think that only experimental video artists can achieve that reaction in a viewer. They remind me of Bill Viola but more... raw. How much can you push sexuality before you desexualise it completely and you transform it into a political statement?
I like the honest Q&A, it’s very interesting how shy the artists become when it comes to explaining their work; no matter how powerful and confident they are in what they do, it’s beautiful when they don’t lose the vulnerability that brought them to create to begin with.
Hoss and I get a drink or two (or three?) and chill in the lounge area, I observe all the people, faces I’ve seen in films, people I talked to via internet, even worked with on distance, and it’s so strange to be here, to feel real, to feel accepted without trying. I meet Kali Sudhra in person, she gets my pronoun right and I can’t hold my glass of gin and tonic still in my hand because I can just be the gender I feel like being and exist in a real space and not only in my head. I feel alive.
We meet an ex sex worker and by talking to her I realise why it is so difficult to me to use a different name for some of my work, and it’s because I have nothing to hide, “Nina Sever” has been with me for so long they became me so intrinsically and unapologetically that I can’t turn them away. I am proud of what I do, whether it’s sexual or not, and if I have to make a pseudonym for a pseudonym, I don’t know who I am anymore and where I’m going, and I lose control and I start feeling like my identity was stolen. Of course, I still need to protect myself because people don’t realise that Internet is a boundary in itself and shouldn’t be crossed so easily all the time.
Back to me and Marcus Quillan in that butterfly position, fully dressed but our boundaries still respected and discussed in advance (thank you Jiz Lee and Shine Louise Houston for being just fucking amazing and for teaching people how to do things properly not only from a technical perspective), I feel like I am exactly where I should be and all my choices that didn’t seem to make sense to anyone I knew back then brought me here and I don’t even know where the fuck I’d be without all these lovely p*rn people.
In all this, I can’t think of a better human being than Hoss to experience the BPFF with. I have this memory of him taking my face between his hands, - and I never fucking allow anyone to touch my face - pulling me towards him against my will that I give up so easily in my brain but I gladly create a slight resistance in my body to the point I’m soaking wet between my legs. I’ve never had a kiss like that before because I’ve never been so free. Especially because I am surrounded by the best people that are not afraid to be themselves or to play a character or to just let go for a night. I walked home barefoot because I broke my boots pole dancing and I don’t know what is it with me and the shoes, or the hair that I cut or grow depending on where I am in my life, but anytime I throw away a pair of shoes after a party I see it as the end of an era. It’s a statement.
“Fucking” thank you Berlin.
