House of Rencong

In January 2018, the Indonesian police raided several hair salons in the province of Aceh, torturing dozens of trans hairdressers in one of the country’s most violent anti-LGBTQ+ persecutions. Traumatic photographs of the torture were published by the police and went viral around the world, becoming the dominant visual representation of the trans community in Aceh. Four years later, as the threat of persecution remains ever present, survivors meet discreetly with trans artist, Tamarra, to explore performance as a means for collective healing. House of Rencong imagines what radical queer liberation looks like beyond the limits of Western visibility politics.