Since the beginning of 2021, Alistair Debling and Kat Rahmat have been exchanging letters as part of their collaborative #BritishCouncilCTC film project, “On the Queer Time of Elephants”, supported by British Council #ConnectionsThroughCulture programme. As part of our #PrideMonth celebrations, we are excited to share an extract from one of their letters. Dated 17th of February, Alistair describes to Kat how, in the face of tragedy and a pandemic, he found joy and hope on the Club Quarantine dance floor. “On the Queer Time of Elephants” places London’s queer venues and Malaysia’s wild elephant population into an unexpected conversation about precious ecosystems, habitat loss and the politics of visibility. For a further glimpse into the making of the film, you can follow the project’s video diary on Instagram @notesontime. Stay tuned for the project’s website launch in August 2021 and future screenings in collaboration with @ilhamgallerykl. ------------------- "Dear Kat... ...I recently attended a very different kind of memorial. This one was live-stream only. As I am let into the zoom 'room', people from all over the world populate the grid. A group of friends dances ecstatically, one attendee sits facing out of the window, applying make-up in the sun (I assume they must be on the West Coast of America as its 11pm and pitch black here). One companion gives another a haircut on camera. An older attendee scrolls on their phone, apparently unaware that they have been 'spotlighted' by the organisers. Another lies on a bed with an oversized, cartoonish wind-up telephone: maybe they're getting in touch with one another. A clown-like, red-and-white glittered visage drips with small chains of diamond tears. A little over 700 small party goers have gathered to mourn the loss of SOPHIE, music-producer and queer icon. I'm still trying to formulate why the dance floor is such an important space for queer people ( a task for a different letter, perhaps). But it's the place I've come closest to experiencing true grief, true hope, real ecstasy. It's a place I've felt completely myself and completely forgotten myself; where I've been truly alone and completely together. Isn't that sacred? SOPHIE's music will always be a direct hotline to that affective space. In many ways, the live-stream that felt so inappropriate at my grandfather's funeral was quite fitting here: it allowed us to dance 'singular plural' (to borrow a phrase from [José Esteban] Muñoz), on one dance floor, in 700 different bedrooms, living rooms and kitchen tables. It was extremely moving. For me, it marked the first time in well over a year that I felt utterly happy, even in the face of accompanying tragedy, to be queer."