Drag King Practices in France
A Conversation with Isabelle Salem Diego Sentis and Louise de Ville
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21798367 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Claire Finch (Université Paris 8, corresponding author), Isabelle Salem Diego Sentis, Louise de Ville |
| Year | 2023 |
| Volume | 2 |
| Publication date | 2023-01-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Transatlantica (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1765-2766 • E-ISSN: 1765-2766 |
| Publisher | OpenEdition (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.4000/transatlantica.22059 |
| OpenAlex | W4389249947 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 1 |
combines drag, activism, queer research, and feminist self-defense in their performances and workshops. For nearly 20 years, they have performed as Sister Salem and as Diego the drag king. As Sister Salem of the ardent tongue (Soeur Salem de la langue ardente), they are part of the Couvent du Nord, the Lille-based chapter of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, an activist street performance organization that was central to early mobilizations against sexual intolerance and the HIV/AIDS crisis. Sister Salem has participated in a number of actions that are central to the history of queer practice in France, such as the 2011 exhibition IM/MUNE curated by Emmetrop and Paul B. Preciado, and the Museum of Civilizations of Europe and the Mediterranean's (Mucem) "Histoire et mmoire des luttes contre le sida" (History and Memory of Activism Against AIDS). 1 As Diego, they explore, transmit, and archive drag king history and practices in the context of their workshops. Diego recently organized workshops at the Sororales festival at the national art center Magasin des Horizons, and on-line during the 2020 lockdowns. Louise de Ville is an actress, burlesque performer, and author. She began her theater career in the United States before coming to France, where her performances drawing on and questioning gender codes established her as a pioneering voice in queer neoburlesque and drag king performance. In the mid-2010s, her weekly burlesque production Pretty Propaganda introduced audiences to a style of queer burlesque that drew heavily on humor as a subversive tool. In 2005, she started the Drag King Fem Show with Wendy Delorme and Mister Mister, one of the foundational moments in the transmission of drag king practices in France in the later 2000s. In 2013, the strongly mediatized drag king workshops that De Ville co-organized with Camille Delalande brought drag king to the French mainstream. The conversation with Isabelle Salem Diego Sentis was conducted by video, in Frenchand subsequently translated into English-by Claire Finch on December 10 th , 2020
Art · Art history · Conversation · Drag · Humanities · Media studies · Sociology · Communication · Engineering · French Urban and Social Studies · History
| Highly cited | No |
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