http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/28/brooklyn-drag-kings_n_4499490.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopularAuthor: James Nichols Source: Huffington Post
This is the ninth installment in an ongoing series that explores drag culture and the nightlife scene in Brooklyn, N.Y. Over the past several years, following the large-scale exodus of artists across the East River and into northern Brooklyn, those engaged in drag culture in this outer borough have rethought what "drag performer" signifies. Accompanied by a larger movement to understand drag culture outside of the pageant circuit, many individuals engaged in the drag community throughout Brooklyn approach drag culture through a nontraditional lens of "alternative" drag or performance art. Do you feel that drag kings receive as much visibility in the drag community as other forms of drag performance?It does seem like kings have less visibility, if not in the immediate drag community than in a larger cultural understanding of drag... It's been exciting to see "RuPaul's Drag Race" bring queens into the mainstream in a kind of unprecedented way, but king performance hasn't received the same kind of celebration or recognition -- yet.
What is your goal with your performances? In what way are you attempting to challenge notions of gender and sexuality?We play a lot with reinterpreting mainstream heterosexual masculinity as queer female-bodied masculinity but we also like to explore layers of homoeroticism between kings.
