The Museum of Trans Hirstory & Art (MOTHA) and the exhibition “Trans Hirstory in 99 Objects” was founded as a conceptual art project by artist Chris E. Vargas, a video maker and interdisciplinary artist currently based in Bellingham, WA, who performs as its Executive Director.
MOTHA’s physical status is “forever under construction” which allows the project to take multiple forms such as exhibitions, poster graphics, performances, and a virtual artist residency program.
Transgender Hirstory in 99 Objects (exhibition series) examines objects that hold significance in narrating the history of transgender communities. The project blurs the line between the real and the imaginary, the known and the unknowable, giving visibility to actual people and events that remain foundational for transgender history while embracing partial facts, rumors, and maybes.
The project was inspired by the Smithsonian’s book, American History in 101 Objects, which was in turn inspired by A History of the World in 100 Objects by the BBC and the British Museum.
Released in 2024 as a book, Transgender Hirstory in 99 Objects celebrates trans forebearers, highlights struggles and triumphs, and reflects on the legacies of trans creative expression. Contributors include Kate Bornstein, Ria Brodell, Vaginal Davis, Leah DeVun, Mo B. Dick, Zackary Drucker, David Getsy, Martine Gutierrez, Andrea Jenkins, Jade Guarano Kuriki-Olivo (Puppies Puppies), Thomas (T.) Jean Lax, Abram J. Lewis, Miguel A. López, Amos Mac, Cyle Metzger, Deborah A. Miranda, Morgan M Page, SA Smythe, C. Riley Snorton, Dean Spade, Sandy Stone, Jeannine Tang, Michelle Tea, McKenzie Wark, and many others.
Probe new horizons where institutional critique and trans culture meet at www.motha.net. Purchase the book at www.motha.net/book.
Hiroes & Trancestors
In 2013 MOTHA produced a promotional 33″ x 22.75″ broadside featuring 280+ individuals: artists and activists; the famous and the infamous; the real and the fictional; the living and the passed; those who self-identify as trans and those who predate the category altogether.
Get the latest 2023 version by going to www.motha.net/gift-shop/p/transgender-hiroes-10th-tr-anniversary-broadside. The 2013 poster is available at www.motha.net/gift-shop/p/motha-transgender-hiroes-poster.
The mission of MOTHA is to ask audiences to think critically about what a visual history of transgender life could and should look like, and if it’s even possible to compile a comprehensive history of an identity category for which the language is fairly new, sometimes contested, and still rapidly evolving.
