Sasha Velour's Speech at Nightgowns
Sasha Velour's legendary Nightgowns took place on September 28, showcasing various forms of alternative drag. Curating a night of ingenuity, beauty, and gender-bending, Sasha Velour flew in performers from across the globe included Vander von Odd, Sash Colby, Donna Trump, and so many more.
Scroll through to see some of the photos from this past weekend's Nightgowns, but before you do, read what Sasha recited to the crowd at the beginning of the show. Her speech illustrates her philosophy about life, politics, the queer community, and of course, drag.
"Drag is full of contradictions. Down to its very roots. We dismantle things even as we fetishize them. We put them on a pedestal, just to strip them of their power.
Drag does this to gender. We champion and recycle all the binary cliches of gender, ultimately weakening the hold that same binary has over us. Sure I love the idea of masculinity and femininity...but only as ideas, not imperatives.
We celebrate the world as it can be, and ignore the world as it is. That's why drag is the ultimate antidote to our pseudo-intellectual culture of cynicism, todays widespread apathetic conservatism masquerading as "realism"...Drag offers one of the most direct strategies for change: DIY utopianism.
Don't like your gender, change it, it's yours anyway! Don't like the standards of beauty? Fuck em! Demand your own! Build something new, make something happen, put on a show!
Sometimes the show we are able to create is a little rough around the edges...held together with duct tape, krazy glue, and a lot of forgiving glitter...that's why it's a DIY kind of fantasy, but sometimes I think that's more utopian than perfection anyway.
What matters most is the intention: to create, for just one night, a space defined by freedom and diversity of expression, centering non-binary & trans people, women, queer people of color, young and old, fat and thin, famous and not. People like all of us.
Drag developed as a form of radical queer theater in bars and balls and pageants. our power to entertain has been a survival tactic for thousands of years. Even under brutal conditions, queer people can create joy, not just for themselves, but for each other.
The true promise of drag isn't celebrity and grandeur, it's community and togetherness. If we lose sight of that, I think we actually might lose the point of drag.
Anyone can put on a gown in their mirror and feel their fantasy. DRAG happens when an entire community forms to keep those people safe outside their own mirror. DRAG happens when an entire community cheers and supports queer self-expression, and rallies for it not just in here, but out on the streets. DRAG happens when we don't just dress up ourselves, but also dress up the world.
You are part of DRAG. So please, do your part to keep this a family affair. Practice kindness and respect in every space you go, even online. Refuse to be exclusionary, especially to queer people that already experience being cast aside.
In a drag show, just as in life...there are moment to be loud, there are moment to listen. You have to figure out what's appropriate, but when you are loud, be very loud. And when you are listening, give it your full. It sounds simple, but I think listening is a bit of a lost art. Tonight we'd like to invite you to put down your phones. We have several professional photographers with actual cameras, a videographer...darling we are masters of our own image, all we need from you are open and loving eyes! Now let's have some drag!"
K. James and Vigor Mortis
Lady Quesa'Dilla
Lypsinka
Neon Calypso
Sasha Velour
Sasha Velour, Janet Jackson, Vander Von Odd & Sasha Colby
Shea Coulee
Untitled Queen
Sasha Colby
Vander von Odd
Victoria Sin
Donna Trump
Mx Viv
