Icon alert! After 10 years of transgender “hormone therapy,” artist Lorenzo Triburgo stopped taking testosterone in an attempt to embody gender abolition. Triburgo’s body and its metamorphosis towards gender ambiguity became source material for Shimmer Shimmer, a collaboration between partners Lorenzo Triburgo and Sarah Van Dyck.

The figurative images in Shimmer Shimmer feature Triburgo’s glitter-adorned nude form in familiar, gendered, art historical poses, photographed by Van Dyck on location at the historically gay section at the People’s Beach at Jacob Riis Park in Queens, New York (known as Riis Beach), now a haven during the summer months for NYC queers. 

The shimmer of glitter on Triburgo’s figure conjures queerness through camp and the political importance of queer joy, but glitter in Shimmer Shimmer is also used to suggest a mythical, celestial presence and hint at a connection to queering astrology. Portrayals and myths of Greco-Roman gods and goddesses inform the visual framing of the images, but glitter, camp, and Triburgo’s trans*queer body itself, rework these gendered interpretations and shift the viewer towards a trans*queer, astrological interpretation. When we recognize their visual references to familiar, art historical representations, such as in Venus, the glitter on both the figure and in the still lifes of glitter as “constellations” work to signal their connection to queer astrology, an important mode of spiritual connection for Triburgo, Van Dyck and their queer community. 

At the time of this screening in 2022, the buildings that backed the queer section of Riis Beach were slated to be demolished, with the surrounding area shut down for the construction of a parking lot. Despite the impending displacement from the space that Shimmer Shimmer preemptively paid homage to, these photographs of a trans*queer figure shimmering with glitter, taking up metaphorical and literal space, evoke a sense of hope and resilience.