The greatest joys (and tragedies) of queerness lie in its resistance to definition. Even the word “queer” has a constantly shifting meaning – one of my favourites is Eve Sedgwick’s: “the open mesh of possibilities, gaps, overlaps, dissonances and resonances, lapses and excesses of meaning when the constituent elements of anyone’s gender, of anyone’s sexuality, aren’t made (or can’t be made) to signify monolithically”.

Taylor Mac’s most recent four-hour extravaganza, Bark of Millions, revels in this open mesh of possibilities; covers itself in the glitter of it; and vomits all over it.

Bark of Millions at Sydney Opera House. Photo © Daniel Boud

Described by Mac in a delightful program note as (maybe) “an opera-concert-song-cycle-musical-performance-art-piece-play,” Bark of Millions is all of those things and none of them. Mac says of the show’s intent, “I want to wonder on queerness rather than decide and tell others what it is,” and quickly notes that “Yet, we must accept a certain amount of reality… critics will define it if you don’t”.

As Gilda Williams once wrote (in...