Queer Objects That Speak: Aesthetics and Symbolism from Non-Binary Identities in Aguascalientes Drag

Abstract

This article reflects on the relationship between performativity, drag performance, and queer objects from a theoretical and phenomenological perspective, focusing on non-binary identities that practice drag in Aguascalientes, Mexico. Drawing on the theoretical contributions of Judith Butler, Teresa De Lauretis, and Sara Ahmed, it analyzes how drag functions as a political tool that destabilizes the binary sex-gender system through the appropriation of gender technologies and objects that generate disorientation. It argues that non-binary drag corporealities employ aesthetics based on monstrosity, caricature, and alienation as ways of subverting social norms. The text focuses on three drag artists: Clxrity, Ella Moon, and Lvbna Gaia, whose practices reveal forms of resistance and identity construction through the visual, the symbolic, and the performative. Through interviews, photographic analysis, and cultural references, it shows how drag, more than a stage characterization, is a way of life, a political statement, and a way to imagine other possible ways of inhabiting the body and the world, from the radical artistic expression of dissent and political agency.