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Thread: Amanda Harris aka Arkansassy (31) took her own life

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    Sana sana colita de rana beli's Avatar
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    Amanda Harris aka Arkansassy (31) took her own life



    It is with a cutting and keen sadness that I announce the death of Amanda Harris
    This is what her mother would like you you to know: Her community was THE most important thing to her (besides family & Memphis). She says emphatically, "I know that she would not have wanted to hurt any of you. "
    I know from conversations I had with Amanda about grieving, depression, & pain that she *wanted* to hang on and get better- please know that she tried. She tried. I watched her struggle, try to get help, try to want to live.
    ---
    I know that there will be a lot of feelings about this. I have feelings about this. I am gutted. She could not get through the pain she felt. I don't know how I will.
    ---
    I am with her mother making arrangements. I am asking if folks can hold space here. Hold it really fucking tight. Hold it for each other, for the Harris family, for her partners and her pets.
    Please hold off asking questions and just be here. Please show up for each other. Amanda (echoing Bryn) asked that we be kind to each other.
    I have more to say; I just can't right now.

    http://mydeathspace.com/article/2016...k_her_own_life
    Quote Originally Posted by Gawna View Post
    Roses are red, violets are blue, seriously where is the fucking ring I gave Julie and ask her mom about the flowers
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    In all fairness, we have no idea how big this dude's cock was.

  2. #2
    Sana sana colita de rana beli's Avatar
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    She was a photographer for this site - http://www.femmespace.net/



    Amanda Arkansassy Harris is a queer high femme charmer from the South. She was the co-curator of Y'all Come Back: Stories of Queer Southern Migration in the 2015 National Queer Arts Festival, where she exhibited portraits in her EXODUS series. Amanda was named one of the Bay Area's Women to Watch in July 2016 by KQED.

    Her photographs have been published in Glitter & Grit: Queer Performance from the Heels on Wheels Galaxy, G.R.I.T.S.: An Anthology of Southern Queer Womyn's Voices, Towards the "Other" America: Anti-Racist Resources for White People Taking Action for Black Lives Matter, as well as various online sources including Al Jazeera America. She believes in the future of the femme oligarchy and the power of portraits to tell stories.
    Quote Originally Posted by Gawna View Post
    Roses are red, violets are blue, seriously where is the fucking ring I gave Julie and ask her mom about the flowers
    Quote Originally Posted by Ron_NYC View Post
    In all fairness, we have no idea how big this dude's cock was.

  3. #3
    Certified Grumple Bottoms Ron_NYC's Avatar
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    Well this is tragic.
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    Ron was the best part, hands down.

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    Senior Member McCourt's Avatar
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    Very sad. RIP

  5. #5
    Sana sana colita de rana beli's Avatar
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    She's was a gorgeous girl. I wish I have as much confidence as she appeared to have in her photos. So sad that she decided to go.
    RIP Akansassy
    Quote Originally Posted by Gawna View Post
    Roses are red, violets are blue, seriously where is the fucking ring I gave Julie and ask her mom about the flowers
    Quote Originally Posted by Ron_NYC View Post
    In all fairness, we have no idea how big this dude's cock was.

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    Sana sana colita de rana beli's Avatar
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    For many in the Bay Area queer and arts communities, the news of Bay Area-based artist Amanda “Arkansassy” Harris’ untimely death came as a shock. The photographer, curator, activist and self-proclaimed “queer high femme charmer from the South” passed away on Friday, Sept. 24. She was 31.

    Originally from a “one-stoplight town” in Arkansas, Harris moved to San Francisco six years ago in search of a diverse queer and artistic community to call her own. Unlike many transplants to the Bay Area, however, she was keenly sensitive to the reality that the things which drew her here — the region’s diversity, especially — were also disappearing with the influx of new populations.

    “I love all those things about the Bay Area, and I also mourn that a lot of those things aren’t really staying around,” she told me in August. “I also question my place in that as a white person migrating to the Bay Area. What does that mean for people who have been here for a long time?”

    Partly in answer to that question, Harris co-curated the exhibition Y’all Come Back: Stories of Queer Southern Migration at the SF LGBT Center for the 2015 National Queer Arts Festival. Featuring work by queer Southern artists, Y’all Come Back dismantled stereotypes of the South as an intolerant, heteronormative region, employing personal narratives of movement between the Bay Area and the South to draw connections between what might be seen as communities that could not be more different.

    Harris’ own photo series Exodus imagined a mass queer migration to the homesteads of the South. Photographing her subjects in intimate and natural poses against lush rural backgrounds, Harris’ artist statement proposed an alternate reality — or a possible future — in which “queers make their own communities as answers to gentrification… and resist systems of dominance like white supremacy and capitalism.”

    I met Harris through KQED Arts’ Women to Watch series, profiling 20 local artists, creatives and makers for the month of July, culminating in a live event at the San Francisco Jazz Center on Aug. 3, 2016. Harris’ inclusion on the Women to Watch list was a no-brainer. We admired her artistic accomplishments, her focus on underrepresented communities, and her radical, brave, DIY spirit. The one word she chose to describe herself? “Glitterdone.”

    Resistance was a common theme in Harris’ work. The project for which she is perhaps most well-known, Femme Space, documents queer femmes in places where they’ve experienced marginalization, erasure or invisibility. In one photo in the series, Pizza Cupcake — in patterns, yellow pants and with purple and gold-streaked hair — powerfully stares down the camera on a BART train. In another, Denise proudly poses for Harris in skintight yoga pants, a reaction to Lululemon founder and former CEO Chip Wilson’s statement that “not every woman can wear Lululemon pants.”

    Other participants in the series, recently featured as a cover story in the East Bay Express, stand in sports bars, in front of high schools and at their workplaces — all places they seek to reclaim.

    Each of Harris’ Femme Space portraits includes the subject’s name, age, home base, self-identifying descriptors and a passage about their personal experience, transcribed in their own words. In the 25 portraits featured on the Femme Space website, femmes speak of their experiences of violence and the pressure to conform to “stereotypical markers of queerness,” but also talk about femme pride and of standing “powerfully, unapologetically in our bodies.”

    Harris was dedicated to creating a platform for queer femme visibility. As she described her subjects onstage in August: “All genders, all backgrounds, all religions, races, abilities, as many as I can depict. Our daily lives are so full of assumption, it’s so important for us to tell our own stories and be seen in the ways we want to be seen.”

    Though I only had the pleasure of spending 15 short minutes on a stage with Harris, her dedication to her art and her generous spirit were clearly evident. I and so many others mourn the loss of a talented and inspiring artist who was just beginning to make her mark.

    A memorial service for Amanda Harris will be held at Sullivan’s Funeral Home in San Francisco on Wednesday, Sept. 28, from 6-8pm. Please visit the event page for details.

    Additionally, a GoFundMe campaign has been established to raise money to cover the funeral and memorial costs. Any additional funds raised will go to an organization Harris supported.

    https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/2016/09/28...nsassy-harris/
    Quote Originally Posted by Gawna View Post
    Roses are red, violets are blue, seriously where is the fucking ring I gave Julie and ask her mom about the flowers
    Quote Originally Posted by Ron_NYC View Post
    In all fairness, we have no idea how big this dude's cock was.

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    Certified Grumple Bottoms Ron_NYC's Avatar
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    Yea, that's definitely my type of hype.
    Quote Originally Posted by bowieluva View Post
    Ron was the best part, hands down.

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    Senior Member Killingtime's Avatar
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    The post from her mother was so touching... Made my heart race a bit Rip

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    Senior Member daisylane's Avatar
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    OW. I wish I waited to read this one, what a wonderful human. And the mother is just an angel.

    RIP beautiful Amanda

    GFM: https://www.gofundme.com/amandaarkansassy
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    DONT MAKE ME FUCK YOUR BITCH THAT PUSSY POPPIN

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    Senior Member Jezebelle's Avatar
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    "Glitterdone!"
    I love it! I hope I'm correct in assuming that it's said with the same cadence Larry The Cable Guy uses with his signature phrase "Git Ur Dun" (however it's spelled). I think I would have liked her a lot.
    RIP Amanda

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