Liesel the Gorilla

Gorilla Milk

Liesel Burisch

Liesel Burisch, Csilla Frank

Gorilla Milk documents the meeting between an artist, a YouTube vlogger, and a gorilla. Mixing recordings from the meeting with archival content from the vlogger’s YouTube account, the video explores the artist’s and vlogger’s similarities with, and projections onto, the gorilla. The conversation centers around the beauty of the gorilla, who suffered a severe drop in popularity when her breasts started sagging. The public and the caretakers lost interest. And after losing her fertility, even her troop rejected her. Gorilla Milk aims to discuss motherhood, body dysmorphia, and the life of a female in captivity —by the ideas of bystanders, audience, society, and caretakers.