INTERVIEW WITH JONATHAN LOVETT BY DANIELLE KHAN DA SILVA
IMAGES BY JONATHAN LOVETT
Jonathan Lovett (b. 2000) is a photographer who was raised in Los Angeles and currently resides in New York City. Their work explores the connection between queer individuals and nature through questions of queer ecology by highlighting alternative modes of interacting with the natural world. They recently finished their thesis at Parsons School of Design, New York, titled “off the beaten path, there is a flowering,” a photographic project and essay that explores queer ecology. I had the pleasure of interviewing them about their project.
You titled your work “off the beaten path, there is a flowering” – I’m curious about how many layers deep this goes, and why you decided on framing your work with this title?
I was actually really struggling with titling this work. I felt too close to it to actually give it a name. During spring break at school, I made a trip to the desert to try and distance myself from the work and also remember why I was making this work in the first place. Sometimes when I get so far into a project, it all becomes too big for me to even think about. The phrase “beaten path” came to me as something I’ve heard floating around outdoor spaces that tend to be very cishet and colonial. I was thinking what lies beyond that, where does this work live? The word “emergence” kept coming to me as a framework to think about queerness within nature. Something that emerges as we look at the natural world through a more observant lens. But the word “emergence” seemed too academic and too much of a buzzword. While I was in the desert, there was a super bloom happening and I kept wondering how these flowers decide when is the right time to “come out” or to blossom. This is how the work got titled. The flowering is a type of queer emergence that lies beyond “the beaten path.”
The opening line of your project is “queerness is everywhere.” How does queerness show up in “nature”?
This is a really good question. I would say that the word “queer” is a human construct that comes with years of suffering and is deeply tied with politics and homophobia. So queerness within nature is definitely different than in a human context. Queerness within nature can show up in so many ways. In my project, I photographed Garibaldis (a type of damselfish). These fish, like many fish, are all born female and at some point during their life will transition to male in order to reproduce and ensure the survival of the species. I think this is so wonderful, queerness as a means of continued survival.
There is also evidence of homosexual behavior from insects to large mammals on every continent on the planet. Queer penguin child rearing, bighorn sheep engaging in homosexual sex for 8 months out of the year, lesbian bonobo couples, these are just a few examples. This can be taken further as well, with plants having alternative modes of kinship and chosen families, from nursery logs to trees sharing food with other trees that are not in their direct family group. Even fungi can be viewed through this lens, as many types of fungi have many biological sexes. An amazing example of this is Schizophyllum commune, a fungi with an astonishing 23,000 biological sexes. In this sense, “queer” does not necessarily mean what it means in humans. “Queer” can simply mean anything that diverges from this established box that western science claims all of nature can fit into. As we are discovering more and more of this queerness, it is obvious that this box is false and needs to be completely reevaluated.
You write: “Queer people have often had the ‘natural’ used against them to justify homophobia.” Later in the essay, you share that you have also been made to feel “unnatural.” Can you elaborate on what you mean by this and how it ties into your queer lineage?
Yes, for sure. I was born to two moms, and one of my moms, Sharon, passed away when I was 3. I have a lot of archival imagery from before she passed away because she made a lot of photos. Something I noticed from those images is that so many are outside in green spaces. I know from stories that my mom had a really deep connection with nature. My other mom, on the other hand, really didn’t in my childhood, so I was in these spaces a lot less frequently after Sharon passed away. My other mom was born in Alabama and has some, absolutely understandable, internalized homophobia. I remember the first time I realized that people view queerness as something not natural was when my mom told me that her lifestyle was “alternative”. This also happened at school. When people would find out I had two moms, they would say it’s not natural. When I started to realize I was gay, I was terrified because of all this rhetoric surrounding my parents. I felt like I was “unnatural” now as well. And, of course, when I did finally come out, I was in a pretty conservative high school and faced a lot of bullying. This made me feel further “unnatural” and really separated me from the “natural” world. I didn’t feel like it was a space for me.
This bell hooks quote that you included really got me: “…Queer as not about who you’re having sex with–that can be a dimension of it–but queer as being about the self that is at odds with everything around it and has to invent and create and find a place to speak and to thrive and to live.” Can you share how you relate to this?
Yes! I absolutely love that quote because it also works as a really wonderful definition of what queer ecology can look like, where nature is at odds with how it is categorized. I also really relate to this quote on a personal level for all the reasons I spoke about—that is, my upbringing, being bullied, and feeling that my identity was something unnatural. I also feel that this project was my way of inventing that space that Bell Hooks speaks about. It was about building a world where my partner Quinn and I could exist together. I think of it as a reimagining of a Garden of Eden, a queer utopia free of homophobia where queerness is integrated into nature. This is also why I chose to use the nude body, finding the connections between the land and the human body. To show that queerness, and queer love, is absolutely natural.
You share your “coming out” story in the essay, and about how you felt you became “barred from participating in a lot of activities” because the “outdoorsy” people on one side of the family have a relationship to nature that isn’t aligned for you. Can you share more about what this looks like?
Yeah, this is a really big issue that I had to overcome. It is also an issue that much of my queer chosen family has had to overcome. I don’t want to speak for the entire queer community, but for me at least, the way that I see some “outdoorsy” people interact with nature is not something I relate to at all. I don’t believe that the natural world should be a means of displaying strength, manliness, or a need to conquer and dominate the land. I strongly dislike the rhetoric of hiking to “conquer a mountain”. It does not matter how heavy your pack is, how strong you are, etc. Being in nature should be about developing a relationship with the land you are on. It should be about developing a sort of intimacy with all of the living beings that are surrounding you. As equals. We are not more important than all the beings we share this planet with.
For some real examples, when hiking with straight folks, I have been really uncomfortable in how I was made to feel. I have been made to feel weak, a “sissy”, or just been told that I should not be taking up space in natural spaces. I think this is something that other queer folks may be able to relate to. People try to gatekeep the natural world, which is so absurd because we are all natural creatures. We all deserve to have access to and be in nature. It is our home.
How does your relationship with your partner play into the project?
My relationship with my partner is a huge part of this project and my life in general. Quinn has really helped me get to the place I am today in terms of my relationship with nature. They are from a small town in Colorado and grew up surrounded by nature. I am from Los Angeles, so that was less of a reality for me. Since we have been together, my relationship to nature has changed so much. They helped me become more intimate with nature, overcome my internalized homophobia that made me feel that queerness was unnatural, and really showed me how queer nature can be. I think we have taught each other so much about viewing nature as a queer space. I am so grateful for them and how they allowed me to photograph them in such vulnerable ways. I think we view nature in very similar ways, so focusing my lens on our relationship for this project felt like the right thing to do.
Can you tell us about the creation process and about some of the choices you made along the way?
Yes! The work was made using a combination of 35 mm and 120 mm film. All of the film was developed and scanned by me, as well as printed by me at various sizes. I chose to work in an analog way as that is generally how I work, but also it keeps me very close to the work at every step of the process. I also think there is so much beauty in analog photography. When using film, it really becomes about touch and tactility: how the light is touching the subject, and then how the reflected light is touching the film. The work also required a lot of research and learning/unlearning. Looking at lots of different artists, reading lots of texts, some very academic and science-based, and some more prosaic art-based writing. Some of my biggest influences in this project were “Undrowned” by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, “Gathering Moss'' by Robin Wall Kimmerer, “Annihilation” by Jeff VanderMeer, “Queer Ecologies” by Catriona Mortimer-Sandilands and Bruce Erickson, and the photographic works of David Benjamin Sherry, Mark McKnight, and Terri Weifenbach.
Lastly, why is this work important to you? Who is it for? And what kind of impact do you wish it to have?
This work is important to me because for so long I felt left out and disconnected from the natural world, which is something we really all need to thrive as human beings. We all deserve to be able to take up space in natural spaces and feel a connection to the world around us. I think that is so important. This work is for other queer folks who feel the way that I have felt and so many queer people have felt. It is for queer folks who have been denied a relationship with nature. I really want anyone who has been alienated from natural spaces to feel held and heard by these images. I want them to know that there is space for us. Queerness is ever present in nature and I want people to know and feel that. As far as impact goes, I just want people to feel seen. And possibly for cishet folks who are viewing the work to question their own relationships with nature. No one should be trying to dominate the natural world, or feel that they are somehow above it. Also, I want people who might think that queerness is unnatural to have that viewpoint challenged.
