Queer and masculine lesbian artist Monique Yim wears her chest binder that she had worn in her younger days and records the binding trace on her body. As art, it is a work of performance, body sculpture and photography. As life, it witnesses the body as the battleground of the conflict between a person's physical or assigned gender and the gender with which the person identifies. The trace represents the sense of a personal history about the fluidity of gender identity and gender expression, the paradoxical dilemma of body autonomy and social norms / community ideologies like self-stereotyping, and the conflicting situation of self-empowerment and self-given violence.

This queer themed photography is the artist’s biographical artwork that connects her life and identity with her art again, similar to her performance art Queer Series (2015 - Ongoing) and photography The Daily Norm (2019). Besides representing her personal experience, the issue-based work perhaps represents a collective experience within the LGBTQ+ community, particularly the transgender or masculine lesbian. In fact, all mankind shares individuals struggling with the body and age, race, class, gender, etc. It is inevitably the common ground of human condition.

To many people, breasts represent beauty and femininity. Chest binder is a product designed for queer community, particularly trans man, masculine female like tomboy/butch or gender fluid like non-binary person to flatten their breast, with constrictive materials. A binder became representative of queer and trans culture because many assigned female at birth people wear them to lessen the appearance of their chest to create a more masculine appearance. The first known breast flattening products were in the 1920’s. While chest binding has been around for hundreds of years but commercial binders have been available for about 18 years. As a non-surgical option, binding is shown to relieve some gender dysphoria and promote mental health. Whilst, it discomforts the users in the ways of restricting their breathing and movement sometimes, and can have negative physical side effects.

酷兒和陽剛氣質的女同志藝術家嚴穎嘉戴著她年輕時所穿著的束胸，記錄她身上被留下的痕跡。作為藝術，它是一件行為藝術、身體雕塑和攝影作品。作為生命，它見證了身體作為一個人的生理或原生性別與該人的性別認同之間衝突的戰場。這裡的痕跡，再現了一段關於性別認同和性別表達的流動性的個人歷史，一個身體自主抑或基於社會規範/群體意識形態造成的自我定型的弔詭矛盾困境，以及一場自我賦權抑或自我暴力的衝突局面。

這輯以酷兒為主題的攝影是藝術家的傳記式作品，與她的行為藝術《酷兒系列》（2015 - 現在）和攝影《日常規範》（2019）類同，將她的生活和身份再次與她的藝術聯繫起來。除了展現她的個人經歷之外，這件議題式作品或許代表了LGBTQ+社群，尤其是跨性別或陽剛女同志的集體經歷。事實上，全人類都擁有個體在與身體和年齡、種族、階級、性別等的掙扎和鬥爭。這無可避免地是人類生存狀況的共同點。

對許多人來說，乳房代表美麗和陰柔女性氣質。束胸是為酷兒社群而設計的產品，特別是跨性別男性、像tomboy/butch的陽剛女性或像非二元性別的性別流動人士，用收縮物料來壓平乳房。束胸成為酷兒和跨性別文化的代表，因為許多原生生理性別為女性的人穿著它們來減少胸部顯露，以創造更男性化的外觀。第一個已知的束胸產品出現於1920年代。雖然束胸的行為已經存在了數百年，但束胸商品大約只存在了18年。作為一種非手術選擇，束胸被證明可以緩解一些性別焦慮並促進心理健康。但它有時會令使用者感到不適，如限制活動和侷促呼吸，有機會對身體產生負面影響。

Monique Yim is an artist, educator, curator, art director and certified hypnotherapist who received MA from Central Saint Martins, UK and studied postgraduate programme at Zurich University of the Arts, Switzerland. She mainly engages with performance, mixed media, site specific installation, public, participatory and community art, also film and theatre. Her works largely concern social, cultural and gender issues. She has participated in over 200 exhibitions, festivals and residencies in more than 30 cities across Asia, Europe and Americas. She was awarded international and local awards such as the “Visual Art Performance Made in Public Space” prize at Kassak Centre, Europe and was named the finalist for “Hong Kong Human Rights Arts Prize”. She curated “Performance Art Marathon” in West Kowloon Cultural District. She is frequently a consultant, lecturer, workshop instructor, talk and research conference speaker, and professional trainer of teachers and social workers at overseas and local universities, schools, institutions, events and inclusive projects, whilst has been dedicated to performance art education and pioneered in interdisciplinary practice, eg. creative education, general and life education, cultural and gender studies, expressive arts therapy, psychology, mindfulness and mental health. Her works have always been collected or cited in academic text, and selected as research or teaching materials worldwide.

嚴穎嘉是藝術家、教育家、策劃人、藝術指導和美國註冊催眠治療師，獲英國中央聖馬丁學院碩士及瑞士蘇黎世藝術大學研究院深造。她主要從事行為、混合媒介、場域特定裝置、公共、參與式、社區及社群藝術、電影及劇場。作品關注社會、文化及性別議題。她曾展出於亞洲、歐洲及美洲超過三十個城市逾二百項展覽、藝術節和駐留等，並榮獲國際及本地獎項，如歐洲Kassak Centre「公共空間行為藝術獎」及入圍香港「人權藝術獎」。她曾於西九文化區策劃「行為藝術馬拉松」。她常於大學、學校、機構和項目擔任顧問、講師、工作坊導師、講座及研究會議講者、專業培訓導師。她致力行為藝術教育並開拓跨學科實踐，如創意、通識與生命教育、文化與性別研究、表達藝術治療、心理學、靜觀與精神健康。她的作品屢被收藏與撰入學術專題，及被選為研究與教學材料。