THE GREAT DOMINATRIX
a film and live performance inspired by Charlie Chaplin’s critique of fascism in The Great Dictator (1940)
2018
The Great Dominatrix, 1-channel HD video, 5:40m, 2018
Mocking modern-day political power, Weitz performs as the character of the golem in Hasidic drag with Chaplin-esque physicality and layered cultural references. She mounts a plastic inflatable globe as quick cuts speed through the myriad ways she sexualizes the prop. The film satirizes today’s rulers and the antisemitic troupe of Jewish global domination while libidinizing the sci-fi figure of Yiddish folklore.
In 2021, Jewish dance scholar Dr. Hannah Schwadron published an academic essay about the film titled, “Redressing Power through Hasidic Drag: Julie Weitz in My Golem as the Great Dominatrix,” in Shofar, An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies (Purdue University Press, Volume 39, Issue 3).
The Great Dominatrix, film still, 2018
Refashioning herself as a femme dominatrix in repurposed religious garb and exaggerated Jewish signifiers, the artist revises constructions of the folk golem figure.
Hannah Schwadron, Shofar magazine
The Great Dominatrix, live performance commissioned by L.A.N.D., Los Angeles, CA, 2018
The Great Dominatrix, film still, 2018
The Great Dominatrix has been screened, performed, and exhibited at the 92nd St Y (NYC, NY), The Jewish Museum (Augsburg, Germany), Spring Break Art Fair (LA, CA), Los Angeles Metaphysical Library (LA, CA), The Holland Project (Reno, NV), Experiments in Cinema Festival (Albuquerque, NM), and Coaxial Arts Foundation (LA, CA). In 2018, Weitz first performed The Great Dominatrix at Blue Roof Studios in Los Angeles, commissioned by Los Angeles Nomadic Division and curated by Irina Gusin.
My Golem as The Great Dominatrix, archival inkjet print, variable dimensions, 2018