Photographer Greg Bailey showcases his portfolio of drag queens in Lavender Boy
Greg Bailey has photographed roughly 150 drag artists, amazingly starting with foul-mouthed Willam of RuPaul’s Drag Race fame, and his new show Lavender Boy showcasing his work has just opened.
The free exhibition is happening at Helm Gallery in the bohemian North Lanes of Brighton. The show has been perfectly timed for Brighton Pride and runs until 1 September.
Speaking with Attitude, Greg revealed the name for the show harks back to his teenage years when he first heard his grandmother refer to gay men as “Lavender boys.”
“To me, I loved the term, it was soft, calming, beautiful, and not offensive in the slightest. Also in the hanky code lavender is the colour to signify your attraction to drag queens, or that you are a drag queen, both depending on which pocket you displayed it in,” Greg explained.
He told us that Amanda Lepore was the most exciting drag performer to photograph. After reaching out to the promoter of her UK tour, Greg was invited to watch the show from backstage. “There she was a vision in sheer pale green, jewel-encrusted, and a fur around her shoulders, I honestly nearly cried. She was kind and softly spoken, and when she hugged me, I was terrified of breaking her as she seemed so delicate, and fuck me did she smell incredible! About an hour later I would be sitting down in her dressing room with Chad Michaels and Amanda moaning about foot pain, it was very surreal,” Greg reminisced.
“Queer art and representation is so important, it documents who we are and our culture” – Greg Bailey
While the exhibition is queen-heavy, Greg is passionate about the whole drag community and often turns his lens toward people of colour, trans performers, non-binary people, and the lesbian community that works within the drag scene. In fact, he went on a bit of a mission to create a portrait of drag king Don One specifically for the exhibition.
“Don has a signature hairstyle and I knew I wanted to play with that, and in nodding to Jean-Paul Goude’s portraits of Grace Jones, I wanted to exaggerate the proportions of Don’s hair and add sharp angles into the portrait in post-production,” Greg said.
(Image: Markus Bidaux)
We have all seen the ridiculous backlash against the Paris Olympics for featuring drag artists for their opening ceremony. We asked Greg how he felt about it. “Queer art and representation is so important, it documents who we are and our culture, we deserve to take up space,” Greg continued, “Stop using your beliefs and religion to cover up what this is really about… it’s homophobia, it’s transphobia, it’s queerphobia, and it’s exhausting. Also, the Olympics sprung up from probably the queerest civilisation in the world, so if you’re offended by a little queer representation then maybe sit the Olympics out.”
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