Embrace
LATESHA MERKEL
"Embrace"
by Latesha Merkel
Creator Bio:
Embrace is an animated short film about asexuality--an orientation generally defined by a lack of sexual attraction, regardless of gender. The narrative explores the common asexual experience of feeling different than most of the population, and the isolation, confusion, and self-loathing that difference can create. However, the story also emphasizes the self-love and joy that can come from recognition of one's asexuality and the asexual community, and how it's possible to embrace the orientation by viewing it in a different light.
Director Biography
I'm a fresh-out-of-grad-school animator from the Midwest, hoping to grow as an artist and creator while sharing my first film, Embrace. Thank you for watching my film, and please feel free to check out the director statement below for more information about the motivations behind Embrace's creation!
Director Statement: I realized I was asexual when I stumbled across the term online at the age of 17. At the time, I was overcome with emotions, but primarily by an overwhelming sense of relief. Relief that there wasn't anything wrong with me, and that there was a word and a community for people like me who didn't feel sexual attraction to others. My college years warred between a blooming pride in this new part of my identity, as well as a hopeless feeling of isolation and brokenness as I navigated dating in a very sex-heavy environment. It was years before I truly learned to embrace and love my asexuality as part of myself, viewing it not as something that makes me broken, but as part of what makes me who I am.
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Embrace is a visualization of this emotional journey, condensed into a fictional animated short film. Amani follows the exact same milestones in discovering, wrestling with, and learning to embrace her asexuality, and I hope that in sharing both her story and my own I can connect with other asexual individuals. There is far too little positive asexual representation in the world, so I wanted to create Embrace to help empower, support and unite the asexual community.
Credits:
Latesha Merkel - Creator and Animator
Void Leigh Loomis - Background artist
Shimshon the Gadite - Music Artist