{{Short description|Canadian transsexual videographer and activist}} {{Infobox person | name = Mirha-Soleil Ross | birth_date = 1969 | birth_place = Montreal, Quebec, Canada | known_for = Videography, trans and animal-rights activism | nationality = | other_names = Jeanne B }}
'''Mirha-Soleil Ross''' is a transsexual videographer, performance artist, sex worker and activist. Her work since the early 1990s in Montreal and Toronto has focused on transsexual rights, access to resources, advocacy for sex workers and animal rights. She is also known for art produced under the pseudonym '''Jeanne B'''.
Her notable works include ''gendertrash from hell'', the Counting Past 2 festival, her show ''Yapping Out Loud'', and the film ''Mateřština.''
== Early life == Ross grew up in a poor neighbourhood of Montreal, Quebec. Her family was francophone, worked in construction, and was mostly illiterate.<ref name="satyamag.com" /> She is Métis.<ref name=":72" /> As a teenager during the 1980s, Ross became aware of animal abuse, becoming a vegetarian and getting involved with animal rights activism.<ref name="satyamag.com">{{cite web |last=Vaughan |first=Claudette |date=October 2003 |title=Shaking Things Up: Queer Rights / Animal Rights |url=http://www.satyamag.com/oct03/ross.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305080223/http://www.satyamag.com/oct03/ross.html |archive-date=5 March 2016 |access-date=30 January 2025 |work=Satya |quote=}}</ref> She credited this with increasing her awareness of the needs of other marginalized groups, like queer people and sex workers.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Kuhr |first=Fred |date=July 20, 2005 |title=Activist animals |url=https://xtramagazine.com/culture/activist-animals-23761 |access-date=2026-01-23 |website=Xtra Magazine |language=en-CA}}</ref> She struggled to "pass" as a boy and was often attacked for looking too feminine.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bell |first=Shannon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0WOTAAAAIAAJ&q=feminine |title=Whore Carnival |publisher=Autonomedia |year=1995 |isbn=9781570270222 |location=New York |pages=141}}</ref> Ross moved from Montreal to Toronto during the early 1990s, where she did sex work and began producing zines and videos.
== ''gendertrash from hell'' and genderpress == {{Main|gendertrash from hell}} From 1993 to 1995, Ross and her partner Xanthra Phillippa MacKay published ''gendertrash from hell'', a zine which "[gave] a voice to gender queers, who've been discouraged from speaking out & communicating with each other."<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last1=Mackay |first1=Xanthra Phillippa |url=http://archive.qzap.org/index.php/Detail/Object/Show/object_id/337 |title=Zine: Gender Trash #1 |last2=Ross |first2=Mirha-Soleil |date=1993 |publisher=genderpress |location=Toronto |via=QZAP - Queer Zine Archive}}</ref> They published the zine via genderpress, a company they began in Toronto.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web |title="Transsexual Sisterhood is Powerful": The Making of Gendertrash |url=https://digitalexhibitions.arquives.ca/exhibits/show/gendertrash/exhibition-statement |url-status=live |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20251104081034/https://digitalexhibitions.arquives.ca/exhibits/show/gendertrash/exhibition-statement |archive-date=2025-11-04 |access-date=2026-01-20 |website=The ArQuives: Gendertrash: Transsexual Zine, 1993-1995 |language=en-US}}</ref> ''Gendertrash'' was distributed via queer and feminist bookstores, then shared widely among trans people and the queer underground scene, helping form a collective trans culture.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Fellini |first=Dallas |date=December 2025 |title=Gendertrash From Hell |url=https://brooklynrail.org/2025/12/art_books/gendertrash-from-hell/ |access-date=2026-01-19 |website=The Brooklyn Rail |language=en}}</ref><ref name=":4">{{Cite web |last=Randle |first=Chris |date=June 30, 2020 |title=Queer People Have Always Found a Way to Tell Their Own Stories |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/history-of-queer-media/ |access-date=2026-01-20 |website=VICE |language=en-US}}</ref> In 2025, Ross and Cat Fitzpatrick compiled ''gendertrash'' issues and archival materials into a 2025 book, ''Gendertrash From Hell'', published by LittlePuss Press. It has a foreword by Trish Salah and afterword by Leah Tigers.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |last=Bradley |first=H Felix Chau |date=November 4, 2025 |title=This trans zine from the '90s has never been more relevant |url=https://xtramagazine.com/culture/books/this-trans-zine-from-the-90s-has-never-been-more-relevant-277703 |access-date=2026-01-19 |website=Xtra Magazine |language=en-CA}}</ref><ref name=":8">{{Cite web |last=Fitzpatrick |first=Cat |date=November 5, 2025 |title=Unearthing The Hidden History Of A Singular Trans Punk Zine |url=https://defector.com/unearthing-the-hidden-history-of-a-singular-trans-punk-zine |access-date=2026-01-21 |website=Defector |language=en}}</ref>
The original zine included art, poetry, resource lists, serialized fiction, calls to action, classified ads, illustrations, collages and movie reviews. By and for transsexual, transgender and transvestite people, it addressed gender experiences at the individual and societal level and prioritized sex workers, low-income queer people, trans people of colour and prisoners.<ref name=":0" /> Articles frequently addressed the erasure of transsexuals from queer communities and the co-opting of trans identities and issues.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Namaste |first=Viviane K. |title=Sex change, social change: reflections on identity, institutions and imperialism |date=2011 |publisher=Women's Press |isbn=978-0-88961-483-3 |edition=2nd |location=Toronto |pages=121}}</ref> Ross and MacKay contributed content to the zine, with Ross sometimes writing under the pseudonym Jeanne B.<ref name=":2" /> Their company, genderpress, also distributed other trans literature, corresponded with local organizations, and sold buttons.<ref name=":3" />
== Videography == Ross' videos, primarily short films, centre on gender, sexuality, animal rights and the transsexual body. Her videos are distributed by Vtape in Toronto.<ref>{{Cite web |last= |date= |title=Artist: Mirha-Soleil Ross |url=http://www.vtape.org/artist?ai=101 |access-date=30 January 2025 |website=Vtape}}</ref> Ross described her filmmaking in her site's biography:<ref name=":9">{{Cite web |last=Ross |first=Mirha-Soleil |date= 18 July 2006|title=bio |url=https://mirhasoleil.wordpress.com/bio/ |access-date=2026-01-23 |website=Mirha Soleil |language=en}}</ref>
{{Blockquote|text=I have always seen my work as activist-oriented and as contributing to changing the terms of the conversations around transsexual issues. In addition, my video making has been motivated by my desire to contribute to the development of a small but radical body of work produced by a handful of transsexual film and video makers internationally. Until 1998, most of my videos were concerned with archiving transsexual histories while challenging audiences – particularly those from the lesbian, gay, and feminist communities – with uncensored and diverse representations of transsexual lives, sexualities, and political struggles [...] My focus has shifted to developing a visual language that articulates the joys and perils of living culturally, sexually, and spiritually in a transsexual body.}}
Laura Horak lists Ross as an important early trans porn filmmaker, along with artists like Christopher Lee, Stephanie Anne Lloyd, Buck Angel, Morty Diamond, and Cary Cronenwett.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Horak |first=Laura |date=2020-05-01 |title=Curating Trans Erotic Imaginaries |url=https://doi.org/10.1215/23289252-8143477 |journal=TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly |volume=7 |issue=2 |pages=274–287 |doi=10.1215/23289252-8143477 |issn=2328-9252|url-access=subscription }}</ref> Amy Marvin points to Ross and MacKay's film ''Gender Troublemakers'' as an important early example of trans-for-trans, or t4t, publishing.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Marvin |first=Amy |date=2022-02-01 |title=Short-Circuited Trans Care, t4t, and Trans Scenes |url=https://read.dukeupress.edu/tsq/article/9/1/9/294560/Short-Circuited-Trans-Care-t4t-and-Trans-Scenes |journal=TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly |language=en |volume=9 |issue=1 |pages=18 |doi=10.1215/23289252-9475481 |issn=2328-9252}}</ref> Daze Jefferies compares Ross' art to that of Nina Arsenault, saying that each "explore the spatial and spiritual registers of transsexual womanhood".<ref>{{Cite journal|url=https://doi.org/10.2979/jfr.2023.a912089|title=Fish Trade Futures: Counter-Archives and Sex Worker Worlds at the Margins of St. John's Harbour|last=Jefferies|first=Daze|date=May–December 2023|journal=Journal of Folklore Research|issue=2–3|volume=60|pages=70|doi=10.2979/jfr.2023.a912089 |via=Project MUSE|url-access=subscription}}</ref> Ross donated her videos and those of her film festival, Counting Past 2, to the Arquives, making her fonds and Rupert Raj's the majority of the trans-related film in that archive. {{As of|2020}}, Ross' fonds were also one of the largest collections of trans films in the world.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://arquives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Trans-Collections-Guide.pdf|title=Trans Collections Guide|date=2020|pages=12, 23|publisher=The Arquives|access-date=January 22, 2026}}</ref>
=== Videos === {| class="wikitable" !Title !Date !Credits !Length !Summary |- |Chroniques |1992 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |12:00 |Clips from Ross' video diary in which she recounts situations where she had unsafe sex with clients.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Chroniques |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=1447 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |An Adventure in Tucking with Jeanne B |1993 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |5:00 |A humorous video that shows Ross attempting to tuck with Scotch tape before meeting a client.<ref>{{Cite web |title=An Adventure in Tucking with Jeanne B |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=3635 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Gendertroublemakers |1993 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Xanthra MacKay |20:00 |Ross and MacKay speak frankly with each other about their sexuality and negative experiences with gay men.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Gendertroublemakers |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=3636 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |I never would have known: A conversation with Peter Dunnigan |1997 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |24:00 |An interview with Toronto activist and trans man Peter Dunnigan about his transition, sexuality, addiction and recovery.<ref>{{Cite web |title=I never would have known: A conversation with Peter Dunnigan |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=3637 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Dysfunctional |1997 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |9:00 |A response to society's fascination with and repulsion from transsexual bodies.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Dysfunctional |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=3735 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Journée Internationale de la Transsexualité |1998 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |38:00 |A documentary about the trans women's event hosted by l'Association des Transsexuels-les du Québec.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Journée Internationale de la Transsexualité |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=4936 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |G-SPrOuT! |2000 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |12:00 |"A cyberspace encounter turns into a trans/polysexual vegan-docu-porno featuring urban veggie lovers speaking out on dating, intimacy and sex in a meat-centered culture."<ref>{{Cite web |title=G-SPrOuT! |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=4462 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Tales from the Derrière |2000 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |24:51 |A video of Ross' 1999 performance of the same name which featured stories from her work and stories about her anus.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Tales from the Derriere |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=4521 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Tremblement de Chair |2001 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |3:40 |A meditation on sexuality in a trans woman's body.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Tremblement de Chair |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=4701 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Madame Lauraine's Transsexual Touch |2001 |Mirha-Soleil Ross, Viviane Namaste and Monica Forrester |34:00 |A film on safer sex between transsexual sex workers and their clients.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Madame Lauraine's Transsexual Touch |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=4811 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Lullaby |2001 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |4:00 |A video produced as part of Ross' performance art piece where she simulated pregnancy for 9 months.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Lullaby |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=4854 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Yapping Out Loud: Contagious Thoughts from an Unrepentant Whore |2002 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |74:00 |A film of Ross' one-woman show by the same name.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Yapping Out Loud: Contagious Thoughts from an Unrepentant Whore |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=5043 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Proud Lives |2002 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |5:00 |Film footage of Ross as the grand marshal of the Toronto Pride Parade in 2001.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Proud Lives |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=5074 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Allo Performance! |2002 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |13:00 |A video of Ross at the Golden Gate Bridge as part of her performance art piece The Pregnancy Project.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Allo Performance! |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=5075 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Materstina (Langue Maternelle) |2003 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |11:40 |"A Czech woman speaks about her exile in Canada and about her sense of loss as it relates to language and her relationship with her children."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Materstina (Langue Maternelle) |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=5261 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Live eXXXpressions: Sex Workers Stand Up |2006 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |15:00 |Footage of Forum XXX, a four-day sex workers' activist event held in Montreal in May 2005.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Live eXXXpressions: Sex Workers Stand Up |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=6184 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Brandee aka Lana Lamarre |2007 |Mirha-Soleil Ross and Mark Karbusicky |3:00 |A memorial video for the performer Brandee, who died in 2007.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Brandee aka Lana Lamarre |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=6762 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |- |Les Vérités Vo(i)lées |2007 |Mirha-Soleil Ross |31:45 |A look at sex workers' response to the scapegoating of sex workers for the spread of HIV/AIDS and other STIs.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Les Vérités Vo(i)lées |url=http://www.vtape.org/video?vi=6763 |website=Vtape}}</ref> |}
== Counting Past 2 == Ross and Xanthra Phillippa MacKay began Counting Past 2 (CP2) in 1997, seeking to make a festival solely dedicated to films and performances by trans artists. They were motivated by the rejection of their film ''Gender Troublemakers'' at a gay and lesbian film festival that instead showed works about gender-bending created by cisgender artists.<ref name=":5">{{Cite journal |last=Horak |first=Laura |date=Fall 2017 |editor-last=Samer |editor-first=Roxanne |title=Tracing the History of Trans and Gender Variant Filmmakers |url=https://cinema.usc.edu/spectator/37.2/2_Horak.pdf |journal=Spectator |volume=37 |issue=2 |pages=15}}</ref> CP2 was the first trans film festival.<ref name=":2" /> Later that year, Zachary I. Nataf and Annette Kennerley launched the five-day First International Transgender Film & Video Festival in London. Christopher Lee and Alex Austin also organized Tranny Fest: Transgender and Transgenre Cinema that year in San Francisco, where Ross presented one short film.<ref name=":5" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=Mission & History |url=https://sftff.org/about-us/mission/ |access-date=2026-01-22 |website=San Francisco Transgender Film Festival |language=en-US}}</ref>
In 1997, 1998, and 1999, Ross ran CP2, providing a space for trans people to speak for themselves without catering to cisgender audiences.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Namaste |first=Viviane K. |title=Sex change, social change: reflections on identity, institutions and imperialism |date=2011 |publisher=Women's Press |isbn=978-0-88961-483-3 |edition=2nd |location=Toronto |pages=67–68}}</ref> The festival's goal was to be more inclusive of trans artists than mainstream gay and lesbian film festivals by centering trans voices, accepting less-polished work and including cabaret and performance components instead of restricting submissions to films.<ref>{{cite book |last=Cowan |first=T.L. |title=More Caught in the Act: An Anthology of Performance Art by Canadian Women |publisher=YYZBOOKS |year=2016 |isbn=978-0-920397-64-0 |editor-last=Householder |editor-first=Johanna |location=Toronto |chapter=Cabaret Performance and the Social Politics Of Scene-Making: A little show that we would do for our riff-raffy freaky friends |editor-last2=Mars |editor-first2=Tanya}}</ref>
Participants included Aiyyana Maracle and Max Wolf Valerio.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ross |first=Mirha-Soleil |title=Counting Past 2 Program |year=1998}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last= |url=https://archive.org/details/aiyyana-maracle-fonds-inventory/page/n3/mode/2up?q=counting |title=Aiyyana Maracle Fonds Inventory |date=2016 |publisher=University of Victoria}}</ref> In 2002, the festival returned after a two-year hiatus, under the stewardship of Boyd Kodak and Cat Grant.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Salah |first=Trish |title=Trans/Acting Culture, Writing, and Memory: Essays in Honour of Barbara Godard |publisher=Wilfrid Laurier University Press |year=2013 |isbn=978-1-55458-839-8 |editor=Karpinski |editor-first=Eva C. |location=Waterloo |page=180 |chapter=Notes Toward Thinking Transsexual Institutional Poetics |editor2=Sowton |editor-first2=Ian |editor3=Henderson |editor-first3=Jennifer |editor4=Ellenwood |editor-first4=Ray}}</ref> In a 2007 interview with Viviane Namaste, Ross said that her efforts with CP2 to create transsexual spaces outside a lesbian and gay framework had failed and that those spaces had disappeared or been absorbed by the LGBT community.<ref name=":1" /> T.L. Cowan named the aesthetics, multi-disciplinary aims, and community-building for marginalized artists as similar between CP2, ''Edgy Women Festival'' in Montreal and ''Hysteria: A Festival of Women'' in Toronto.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Cowan |first=T.L. |date=2019 |title=Edgy + Hysteria: Not Like Sisters, or How Montreal's Edgy Women and Toronto's Hysteria Festivals Got It On Across Space and Time |url=https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1068261ar |journal=Theatre Research in Canada |volume=40 |issue=1–2 |pages=126 |doi=10.7202/1068261ar |via=Érudit}}</ref> Namaste credited CP2 for challenging the autobiographical mode of art that was often the only permitted method for trans people to publish work: "transsexuals have used the opportunity created by CP2 to question the very terms and conditions created by the autobiographical imperative".<ref name="auto1" />
== Performance art ==
=== {{Anchor|Yapping Out Loud}}''Yapping Out Loud'' === Ross produced a one-woman show, ''Yapping Out Loud: Contagious Thoughts from an Unrepentant Whore'', based on her sex work and activism, at the 2002 Mayworks Festival of Working People and the Arts and in 2004 at the Buddies in Bad Times Theatre.<ref name="auto1">{{Cite journal |last=Salah |first=Trish |date=March 2007 |title=What's All the Yap? Reading Mirha-Soleil Ross's Performance of Activist Pedagogy |url=https://ctr.utpjournals.press/doi/10.3138/ctr.130.011 |journal=Canadian Theatre Review |language=en |volume=130 |pages=64–71 |doi=10.3138/ctr.130.011 |issn=0315-0836|url-access=subscription }}</ref> She also performed it at the National Transgender Theatre Festival in New York.<ref name="auto1" /> The show intended to educate audiences about issues facing sex workers and refute stereotypes contributing to violence against them.<ref>{{Cite web |last=O'Connor |first=Jennifer |date=17 April 2002 |title=Sex trade imbalance |url=https://xtramagazine.com/power/sex-trade-imbalance-45559 |access-date=30 January 2025 |website=Xtra Magazine |language=en-CA}}</ref> ''Yapping Out Loud'' also incorporated Ross' animal-rights activism with comparisons between oppression faced by sex workers and coyotes, inspired by the American sex-worker organization COYOTE. COYOTE, standing for Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics, was one of the first advocacy organizations for sex workers rights. Ross had worked as a sex worker for over a decade before creating the show.<ref name="auto1" />
''Yapping Out Loud'' was a 7-monologue cabaret that incorporated many characters, including Ross speaking as herself, and styles of performance.<ref name=":6" /> Along with her monologues, she projected video of coyotes being hunted in the wild, and music produced by activists for animal rights and rights for sex workers.<ref name="auto1" /> Throughout, she equated the antitrans and antiprostitute actions of certain feminists with the physical violence frequently committed against prostitutes and trans people. These are especially acted out via the characters of "Bridge It Taylor!", a "feminist-identified-feminist", "Judy Cuty Q", a grad student in "women's sciences", and the "Whore Hunter", a serial killer.<ref name=":6">{{Cite journal|title=Transfeminist Kill/Joys|url=https://read.dukeupress.edu/tsq/article/1/4/501/91691/Transfeminist-Kill-JoysRage-Love-and-Reparative|journal=TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly|date=2014-11-01|issn=2328-9252|pages=501–516|volume=1|issue=4|doi=10.1215/23289252-2815201|language=en|first=T. L.|last=Cowan|url-access=subscription}}</ref> Each shares an anti-prostitute mission, from Taylor's quest to "rescue" prostitutes regardless of their own desires, to Judy's television show on "Co-existing with Prostitutes", which shares methods on keeping prostitute's out of viewer's yards, and finally the killer's advice on "whore management" explained by a story of the first time he shot a prostitute.<ref name="auto1" />
Ross also delivers four personal monologues speaking in the character of herself. To start the show, she acts out a panic attack caused by being targeted by policing and potential arrest. She then explains how she began sex work, mixing her history with critical analysis and political commentary. Later she explains the humanity and complexity of her clients in contrast to popular characterizations of them. She ends by talking about her experience learning of the Victoria Day 1996 murders of three trans prostitutes in Toronto, one of whom she knew.<ref name="auto1" />
In a 2003 interview, Ross discussed her focus on coyotes and COYOTE during the show. She said that a vivid metaphor between the treatment of prostitutes and coyotes had spurred the group's founder, Margot Saint-James, to name the group after the animal. Ross thought the comparison was compelling but also disturbing, in the same way that the characters she portrayed used prostitutes as symbols for their own ends without adequately representing or compensating sex workers. She wanted the show to challenge audiences to reconsider the symbolic use of animals: "How appropriate is it to compare our own human suffering to that of animals when most of the time, quantitatively and qualitatively, there is so much disparity between the two?"<ref name="satyamag.com" />
T.L. Cowan classifies ''Yapping Out Loud'' as a transfeminist work that takes on the style of the "transfeminist kill/joy", facing up to transphobia and transmisogyny with rage and transformational love, in a similar manner to the "feminist killjoy" defined by Sara Ahmed. Cowan labels ''Yapping Out Loud'' as a reparative, educational performance in a similar manner to Ryka Aoki's "To the New World" and ''Fully Functional Cabaret'' by Star Amerasu, Aoki, Annie Danger, Red Durkin, Bryn Kelly, and Shawna Virago.<ref name=":6" /> Trish Salah also describes Ross' performance as an uncomfortable didactic lesson, challenging viewers to consider the difference between unknown and unknowable things, and "illuminating the privilege and identity stakes investing defensive refusals to know." Salah says Taylor's anti-prostitute feminist monologue "implicates audience members in undoing commonsense understandings of prostitution, transsexuality and so on, from the inside out as it were."<ref name="auto1" />
===Other performances=== Ross served as grand marshal of Toronto's Pride Parade in 2001, and led animal rights activists in the march to publicize the Animal Liberation Front. They wore coyote masks, referencing COYOTE, and held signs sharing the Animal Liberation Front's successes.<ref name=":7">{{Cite web |last=Page |first=Morgan M |date=February 12, 2019 |title=The forgotten legacy of trans artist and activist Mirha Soleil-Ross |url=https://www.dazeddigital.com/art-photography/article/43093/1/mirha-soleil-ross-morgan-m-page-chelsea-manning-trans-art |access-date=2026-01-22 |website=Dazed |language=en}}</ref>
In 2001 and 2002, she performed The Pregnancy Project, a 9-month piece where she appeared in public with a prosthetic belly to spark conversations about gender, motherhood and the possibility of womb transplants for transsexuals.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Brown |first=Eleanor |date=13 June 2001 |title=Pride's special people |url=https://xtramagazine.com/culture/prides-special-people-46165 |access-date=30 January 2025 |website=Xtra Magazine |language=en-CA}}</ref>
== {{anchor|Social service work in Toronto}}Social service == During the 1990s and early 2000s, Ross was involved in social service work for trans and sex worker communities in Toronto.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Namaste |first=Viviane K. |url= |title=Sex change, social change: reflections on identity, institutions and imperialism |date=2011 |publisher=Women's Press |isbn=978-0-88961-483-3 |edition=2nd |location=Toronto |pages=118 |oclc=}}</ref> In 1999, she was the founding coordinator of Meal-Trans at the 519, a drop-in program offering meals and peer support to trans people.<ref name=":10" /> She served vegan meals for Meal-Trans as part of her commitment to animal rights.<ref name="satyamag.com" /> Ross was involved in the expansion of the 519's trans-related programs, providing services for trans people who are HIV-positive and sex workers as well as founding peer support groups for trans men and trans women with colleague Rupert Raj.<ref name=":10">{{Cite news |date=15 June 1999 |title=When she was a boy |work=Xtra!}}</ref> They performed similar supportive roles in Toronto as Sandra Laframboise did with the High Risk Project Society at a Native health center in Vancouver.<ref>{{Cite journal|title=Constellating Trans Activist Histories|url=https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/ghr/article/view/ghr12202321302|journal=The Graduate History Review|date=2023-10-19|issn=1925-2455|pages=196|volume=12|doi=10.18357/ghr12202321302|language=en|first=Niamh|last=Timmons|doi-access=free}}</ref>
Ross worked with women's shelters, community centres and sex worker organizations to improve access and educate service providers.<ref>{{Cite web |date=August 2022 |editor-last=Chabot |editor-first=Frederique |title=The Toolbox: What Works for Sex Workers |url=https://chrr.info/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/POWER_ToolBox_WhatWorksForSexWorkers.pdf |pages=38–41}}</ref> She was involved in pushing back against efforts by residents' associations in the Gay Village and Allan Gardens areas to expel sex workers.<ref>{{Citation |last=Sheffield |first=Rebecka |title=Trans Programming at the 519 Church Street Community Centre: A Case Study in Social Entrepreneurship |date=2011 |pages=7 |place=Toronto |publisher=CAMH}}</ref>
Ross hosted Animal Voices, an Ontario radio show covering animal advocacy and liberation movements, from 1996 to 2001.<ref>{{Cite web|title=About|url=https://animalvoices.ca/about/|access-date=2026-01-23|language=en-CA|website=Animal Voices}}</ref><ref name=":9" /> She has spoken against the use of animals as symbolic metaphors for human benefit without people compensating animals in return, sharing the examples of the coyote metaphor for prostitutes, the furry fandom, and the bear subculture for gay men.<ref name="satyamag.com" /><ref>{{Cite web |last=McLeister |first=Kerwin |date=August 5, 2001 |title=Fur out! |url=https://xtramagazine.com/love-sex/fur-out-46060 |access-date=2026-01-23 |website=Xtra Magazine |language=en-CA}}</ref>
Ross was heavily involved in activism and advocacy. After the 1997 murders of two trans people and one cisgender aboriginal woman in Toronto, Ross, Monica Forrester, and several other activists created a community coalition to push for safe spaces for trans people. Forrester recalled that the original coalition included many trans people of color, but when more white organizers and people with targeted training but less understanding of present issues joined the movement, the original activists were pushed out.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Haritaworn |first=Jin |date=2019 |title=On These Bones: The Queer Regenerations of the Toronto Gay Village Serial Killings |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/751055 |journal=TOPIA: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies |volume=40 |pages=30–31 |doi=10.3138/topia.2019-0015 |via=Project MUSE}}</ref>
Ross' activism consistently pushed the LGBTQ movement to expand its sphere of political support and consider intersectionality. She connected LGBTQ rights with support of sex workers, indigenous communities, and the environment.<ref name=":7" /> In an interview published in 2005, Ross criticized the fact that murdered trans women, including sex workers, poor women, and people of color, are often treated as political tools for others, and events like the Trans Day of Remembrance act "both theatrically and politically, to benefit a privileged subsection of the trans community."<ref>{{Cite web|title=I'm sick of writing about dead trans people|url=https://xtramagazine.com/power/activism/dead-trans-people-writing-278054|date=November 20, 2025|access-date=2026-01-23|language=en-CA|website=Xtra Magazine|last=Thom|first=Kai Cheng|author-link=Kai Cheng Thom}}</ref> Ross also criticized the LGBTQ community in a 2003 interview for not noticing or acting against industrial animal exploitation, noting the use of animal experimentation during AIDS research and the leather subculture of the queer community.<ref name="satyamag.com" />
Syrus Marcus Ware cites Ross as one of the trans and two-spirited activists of color that helped shape Toronto's trans community during the 1990s and 2000s. He says their contributions have received inadequate recognition and documentation. Other activists named are Yasmeen Persad, Monica Forrester, Nik Redman, Sumaya Dalmar, and Duchess.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Ware |first=Syrus Marcus |date=2017-05-01 |title=All Power to All People? |url=https://read.dukeupress.edu/tsq/article/4/2/170/84689/All-Power-to-All-People-Black-LGBTTI2QQ-Activism |journal=TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly |language=en |volume=4 |issue=2 |pages=171, 177 |doi=10.1215/23289252-3814961 |issn=2328-9252}}</ref>
== Personal life == After Ross moved to Toronto in 1992, she began a relationship and artistic partnership with Xanthra Phillippa MacKay.<ref name=":72">{{Cite journal |last=Cunningham|first=Sidney|date=2019|title=Subscribing to gendertrash: The Radical Subcultural Transmissions of Toronto's Original "TransZine"|url=https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/bsc/article/view/32785|journal=Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada|language=en|volume=57|pages=24|doi=10.33137/pbsc.v57i0.32785|issn=2562-8941|via=Érudit|doi-access=free}}</ref> Ross later was the life partner of activist and film editor Mark Karbusicky, who died in 2007.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Mark, Mike Hoolboom's difficult documentary|url=https://xtramagazine.com/culture/mark-mike-hoolbooms-difficult-documentary-10570|date=April 21, 2010|access-date=2026-01-23|language=en-CA|website=Xtra Magazine|last=McKenzie|first=Chaos}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Ten intimate photos that show the private lives of LGBT families|url=https://torontolife.com/culture/this-contact-exhibit-presents-an-intimate-glimpse-into-the-domestic-lives-of-lgbtq2-people/|website=Toronto Life|date=May 22, 2018|access-date=2026-01-23|language=en|last=Bloom|first=Jessica}}</ref> They produced art together as well.<ref>{{Cite journal|title=Vegan Sexuality: Challenging Heteronormative Masculinity through Meat-free Sex|url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0959353509351181|journal=Feminism & Psychology|date=2010|issn=0959-3535|pages=56|volume=20|issue=1|doi=10.1177/0959353509351181|language=en|first1=Annie|last1=Potts|first2=Jovian|last2=Parry|url-access=subscription}}</ref>
== Awards == Ross has received several grants from the Canada Council for the Arts. Her video ''Mateřština'' (co-directed with Mark Karbusicky) won the Marian McMahon Award at the 2004 Images Festival in Toronto.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Irving |first=Dan |date=June 2013 |title=Against the grain: Teaching Transgender Human Rights |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1363460713479746 |journal=Sexualities |language=en |volume=16 |issue=3–4 |pages=319–335 |doi=10.1177/1363460713479746 |issn=1363-4607|url-access=subscription }}</ref> In 2001, Ross was the grand marshal of Toronto's Pride Parade.<ref>{{Cite web |title=About Us |url=https://www.pridetoronto.com/about-us/ |access-date=30 January 2025 |website=Pride Toronto}}</ref> In 2011, she was inducted into Canada's Q Hall of Fame.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Inductees |url=http://www.qhalloffame.ca/index.php/inductees |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140301171834/http://www.qhalloffame.ca/index.php/inductees |archive-date=1 March 2014 |access-date= |website=Q Hall of Fame}}</ref>
== Exhibitions == {| class="wikitable" |+ !Exhibition !Dates !Exhibitor !Location |- |''No Master Territories: Feminist Worldmaking and the Moving Image''<ref>{{Cite web |title=No Master Territories: Feminist Worldmaking and the Moving Image |url=https://www.e-flux.com/announcements/470599/no-master-territories-feminist-worldmaking-and-the-moving-image/ |access-date=10 July 2022 |website=e-flux |language=en}}</ref> |June 19–August 28, 2022 |Haus der Kulturen der Welt |Berlin, Germany |- |''Queering Family Photography''<ref>{{Cite web |last=Bloom |first=Jessica |date=22 May 2018 |title=This Contact exhibit presents an intimate glimpse into the domestic lives of LGBTQ2+ people |url=https://torontolife.com/culture/this-contact-exhibit-presents-an-intimate-glimpse-into-the-domestic-lives-of-lgbtq2-people/ |access-date=30 January 2025 |website=Toronto Life |language=en-US}}</ref> |April 21–May 26, 2018 |Contact Festival, Stephen Bulger Gallery |Toronto, Canada |- |The Edgy Women Festival<ref>{{Cite web |last= |title=Archives / Edgy Women |url=https://www.studio303.ca/en/archives/archives-edgy-women/ |access-date=30 January 2025 |website=Studio 303 |language=en-US}}</ref> |March 2006 |Studio 303 |Montreal, Canada |}
==References== {{Reflist|30em}}
==External links== * [https://arquivescollections.andornot.net/link/descriptions17849 Mirha-Soleil Ross fonds] at The ArQuives
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ross, Mirha-Soleil}} Category:1969 births Category:Artists from Montreal Category:Canadian multimedia artists Category:Canadian video artists Category:Women video artists Category:Canadian transgender artists Category:Living people Category:Transgender women artists Category:Inductees of the Q Hall of Fame Category:21st-century Canadian LGBTQ people