In a mid-November video interview, she described “KICK” as a series of “self-contained, mythical, almost world-building exercises that interrelate to one another.” She had her striped cat, Lain, jump into the picture to say hello as she was holding her mustard-colored Telfar purse from a coat hook.
Ghersi’s body has been used as a 3-D model to create the dystopian dystopia of “KICK,” which can be seen in both the video for “Prada/Rakata” and the album covers. On top of all of the references to the Venezuelan folk hero Mara Lionza, there are images of Ghersi’s own paintings and calligraphy sprinkled throughout.
“KICK” evolved from Ghersi’s vision after her 2017 album. During the time between projects, she began to identify as a transgender woman. “I had the impression that going through slash surviving was something that required special attention. This “reckoning” that she’d put off for so long “took up all my RAM,” she said.
In the past few years, Ghersi has been more open about her interest in the fringes of mainstream pop. Lady Gaga’s song “Rain on Me,” which she released an official remix of earlier this year, is featured in one of the tracks on “KICK ii.” It’s “magical” for her to not make a song that she thinks other people will like at the expense of an experiment or a sound she enjoys, she said. Creating a bridge for people with different aesthetic sensibilities or backgrounds to meet in a shared space that pop can provide is the goal of this project.
Ghersi’s work has a strong sense of community at its core. As much as she can, she strives to blur the line between audience and performer in her performances, making them interactive and engaging for everyone in the audience. A three-night engagement called “Mutant;Faith” was Arca’s 2019 performance series at the Shed in Manhattan, where she invited audience members to join her on a dirt surface that doubled as the stage.
While performing, Björk expressed her admiration and pride in Arca, with whom she co-produced her own albums, “Vulnicura” and “Utopia” in the past. “She improvised for hours by herself, each night being different. “Willing to make herself extremely vulnerable in order to make herself extremely fierce,” she wrote in an email. Emotional intelligence, high programming technique, performance and singing, humour and drama, gentleness and brutality are all rare qualities in a single person.” This hyperhuman has a lot to be admired.”
