The Hidden Pin Up #20 - Taking the Mic!

Friday was a very exciting day where The Hidden Pin Up got taken to the next level via song and spoken word as we spent the morning recording our very own vogue track!

Since we have the first half of the fan dance performance mapped out to a chosen song that evokes the bluesy burlesque of the vintage era (see this past post for details), it was important that the second half was just as strong yet gave our dancer the chance to move and tell her story in a totally different way.

Myself and co collaborator Darren (house mother of the House of Ghetto) decided to go down a vogue route as that is something the House of Ghetto are especially famous for and can be tailored, much like burlesque, to convey whatever message you want. 

With his strong knowledge of dance and music Darren suggested using the words from the feathers on the burlesque fans as direct inspiration to create our own customised track. Cue the arrival of talented performer Justina Aina (check her out, she's great!) who came with us to the Salford's Lowry Theatre to record some samples that will be laid over music.

It was fascinating to see how Justine worked. Having already been given the full set of stories from the fans, she had put them into sections and created a poetical arrangement that could be broken down, repeated, spoken and sang.

With technical manager David Wimpenny on the sound desk (he really knows his stuff and is a technical wizard, thanks so much Dave!) we were able to record several layers including, repeats of lines, whispered paragraphs and free-styled sections.

The next step will be putting everything together and creating the finished track, however we will be having a trial run of the performance including the fan dance and live vocals later this month, more info to follow!

Here's a sample of Justina's freestyling over a track, this wasn't recorded for our final piece but gave everyone an idea of how the live vocals could work. Hearing the stories put together in this context is both uncomfortable and funny. I'm loving how this is turning out and I am looking forward to sharing the finished thing with you!

The Hidden Pin Up #15 - Costume Fitting

Yesterday I met up with the House of Ghetto for the first fitting of the outfit I made for The Hidden Pin Up project. This hemp costume is based on 1940's/50's burlesque styles and is in itself a burlesque of the stereotypical Western ideology of women of colour from that time.

I took influence from girly vintage magazines and Hollywood films of the vintage era to create something immediately recognisable and cliche.

 

I worked directly from my original drawing to make the costume as close to my ideas as possible. It was only after trying the bra top on myself I realised it needed something extra to help keep it in place and stop it from riding about. I based this asymmetric shoulder strap with a flowing back tassel on the costume worn by Marilyn Monroe for her 'Heatwave' number in 'There's No Business Like Show Business'. This is a great example of old Hollywood's version of an 'exotic' non white women, being that it is meant to portray South American sexiness (personally, I have always loved this costume, it is so well designed and put together)...

Here are a few of the other examples of images I used as inspiration for this costume, beginning with Jeni LeGon who was one of the first women I learned about back when I began the Hidden Pin Up. 

LeGon was one of the first women of colour to sing and dance in mainstream Hollywood films. Unfortunately her talents were soon marginalised to unnamed 'native' caricatures like this from the 1936 film 'Swing Is here To Stay'

Evelyn Pitcher's burlesque costume from the 1950's was a strong inspiration. She could have been posing/performing as anything, but she is shown as an exotic savage moving savagely to her 'Devil Dance'.

The White Squaw from 1956 sure knows how to pull off sexy/ savage! I thought this film poster shows the perfect mix of sexy frothy misguided ideas. She might be white but she is appropriating a crude version of non white cultures that were palatable for the Western audience.

 I'm really pleased with how the costume has turned out and after fitting it on gorgeous dancer Lenai, there are only a few minor adjustments needed.

I'm so excited to be working with The House of Ghetto for this project! This all female black vogue house are an artistic force to be reckoned with, and as their house mother and choreographer Darren Pritchard has pointed out, they have no creative boundaries. I'm really excited that this will be their first full on burlesque inspired work and I can't wait to see where this piece goes.

With my burlesque fans almost ready, the next stage is for us to get into the dance studio to begin putting ideas together for the performance.

Burlesque fan with quotes from real life experiences of racial fetishism towards women of colour embroidered into the feathers. To add your own story, get in touch! Comment on this blog or message me on my facebook page

The Hidden Pin Up is an art piece exploring the history of the black Pin Up and the racial fetishes and stereotypes that exist to this day. To find out more about this project read The Hidden Pin Up posts on this blog and follow me on Instagram @gemma_parker_artist

Massive thanks to my mum for her sewing knowledge and letting me use her sewing machine!

Going to the Vogue Ball

Waiting in the long queue that weaved from under the railway arch and spilled out onto the street, my friend and I were relieved that other people had 'made an effort'. In fact, we were stood behind an Egyptian Goddess in all her golden glory which was a good giveaway, and as we got nearer to the door we watched as an 80's leather clad dream complete with a perfect teal bob, sashayed her way to the line. We were in the queue for Manchester's Vogue Ball and Manchester itself did not disappoint, turning up in all her grandeur to witness the event. 

We had been invited by choreographer, dancer and producer of the night, Darren Pritchard in order for me to to see for myself what he described as the 'inside of your head' and to specifically see Manchester's House of Ghetto who I will be doing some art work with (See my research posts about The Hidden Pin Up).

Rikki Beadle-Blair hosted looking superb in fishnets and denim hot-pants and whipped up the crowd; 'By the end of the night you will all have tapped into that little 15 year old black gay boy from Harlem. In a time before there was ever such a thing as a black president (now any tw*t can do it), when he could only find his true voice, his true family and true identity in the vogue ballroom'. We went wild and the show began...

To sum up the feel of  Voguing, it's about inclusivity, expression, creativity and attitude, it isn't a dance contest or a beauty pageant. Those little bitches from America's Next Top Model would get flattened, these dancers and performers were the real deal. There were a number of bouts themed with different titles, 'Solo' 'Icons' 'Sex Siren' 'Fantasy'... each house taking to the catwalk to own it using a combination of catwalk, costume, dance, burlesque and drag. 

 The House of Ghetto pay homage to Josephine Baker

The 'Sex Siren' bout included a Victoria's Secret model and Barbie and Ken and The House of Ghetto took it old school with an homage to Josephine Baker complete with a golden banana skirt and a pretty x-rated way of sharing the fruit. It was so exciting to see this icon being nodded to after looking into black pin up history and writing about her just a couple of weeks back.

It was also great to see my past muse and model, the ever gorgeous Grace Oni Smith, claiming the stage as she performed with her house The House of Decay in an iconic group dance. 

One of the stand out performances of the night was when the panel of judges couldn't choose between The House of Suarez or The House of Decay to win the 'Realness' bout and they ended up dancing it out against each other. It was full on fierce! The House of Decay deservedly won but both contestants were amazing and what really caught my eye was that despite the intense gestures and savage energy between the two, they began and ended the bout holding hands and hugging one another. That summed up the night for me.

Keeping it raw, The House of Ghetto danced to Missy Elliot

But to get to the real meat of the matter, the 'Choreography' bout at the end of the night was where House Of Ghetto reigned supreme, or they should have, narrowly missing out to Liverpool's House of Lipa. This was where the all black female group took control of the catwalk and blew the crowd away. Dancing to Missy Elliot they were stunning. Slick sexy confident and totally on point, I couldn't sit still watching them, the performance was amazing. Everyone else seemed to feel the same way because, as the judges tried to decide who should win that bout, a chant of Ghe-tto! Ghe-tto! Ghe-tto! took hold. They were robbed.

The sights and sounds and the energy in the room were incredible. I've been to burlesque and drag nights, but this was something else, it worked on a whole other level, it felt more raw and immediate. And as promised, while Madonna streamed over the speakers and the lights went up, at the end of the night each person was tuned into their inner 15 year old black gay boy and we felt fabulous!

The Hidden Pin Up #2 - Black Vintage Burlesque

In my second post exploring the history of the black Pin Up I want to look at the world of burlesque during it's hey day during the 1950's and early 60's. With Neo burlesque well and truly now a part of mainstream culture (nipple tassels from Ann Summer's anyone?) it would be easy to assume that today's burlesque superstars are direct examples of the original scene, but that wouldn't be strictly true. For every Dita Von Teese and Immodesty Blaize today, there was a black performer equally as talented and devoted to the art back then. It could be that the media (then as now) chose to ignore performers of colour in favour of the white all American version.

So with this in mind here are some black burlesque performers who should be as well known as the legendary Tempest Storm and Dixie Evans but have fallen from view. Let's take a look at their incredible careers...

Jean Idelle

Imagine, it's 1950 and you're a young black woman who has just told your mother you want to become a burlesque dancer. She, in trying to guide her daughter to opt for a less salacious career, sends you to speak with the local pastor. Thankfully, the pastor is a man with a liberal outlook on life and tells you, if it's what you really want to do, to follow your dreams.

With Gods blessing Jean Idelle went on to become one of the most sought after exotic dancers of her era. She was a naturally gifted dancer and having studied under Katherine Dunham, she was soon 'discovered' and began performing at Minsky's Burlesque show in Chicago where she worked her way up to become a headline act taking to the stage between 1950 and 1964.

Idelle's trademark performance was dancing with huge white ostrich feather fans and at the height of her career she was earning around $1000 a month. By today's standards that's around $8600, which for a black performer makes the sum even more impressive considering the racism and segregation of the time .

The amount of money Idelle was making was due to her impeccable performances. Professionalism was very important to her and she was never late never sick or sloppy. For such a woman to be so successful both professionally and financially it seems odd that her name is not better known.

Perhaps Idelle's true legacy should lie in her success at performing in both white and black clubs across the U.S and Canada. It can't have been easy staying true to your art in the face of adversity.

Lottie 'The Body' Graves

By the 1960's burlesque was beginning to loose it's appeal. In order to gain bigger audiences the focus became less about the art form and more about the strip, resorting to showing more skin, and mingling with the punters.

Having been classically trained as a dancer, Graves began her burlesque career at the early age of 17 and brought a dash more class to her performance. She stood out thanks to her elegant moves and outstanding figure.

Graves said that exotic dancing was 'top of the shelf, the champagne of dance' and her polished art form gave her the opportunity to lead an equally glamorous lifestyle rubbing shoulders with the likes of Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong and Aretha Franklin.

Motown legend Martha Reeves a friend and neighbour stated,

'She held her own. Lottie had skills that were superior to all of her competitors. She out-danced them all.

She had body movements that only she could pull off, and very elaborate costumes. And I know she can still dance, and does a high kick that shows a lot of young ladies [up]'

Like Jean Idelle, Graves can be credited with breaking through racial tensions at the height of open racism by performing at white clubs. Never classed as a stripper, Graves unique moves set her apart from other bump n grinders and she transcended both the burlesque and racial barriers. 

Toni Elling

At the age of 32 Toni Elling began stripping quite late in life. It was 1960, and after spending nine years struggling to get a promotion in her telephonist job, and being denied one because of her race, Elling had had enough. It was after taking some advice from her friend Rita Revere, herself a stripper, Elling decided to give the burlesque scene a try.

Taking her stage name from Duke Ellington, Elling started her new career in The Flame Show Bar in Detroit. (She and Ellington were good friends and it is rumoured he wrote the song 'Satin Doll' in her favour). 

Of her first gig Elling said, “I was surprised I knew what to do and that it went over so well. I wouldn’t get an agent, though. Didn’t know why I needed one. So many places I couldn’t work because of the colour thing. An agent who was a friend booked me in Lima, Ohio. Word got around and after that, I found it easy to get work outside Detroit. I finally got a bit of a reputation.”

She had many gimmicks to fill out her repertoire. A Spanish act in a flamenco dress, a wedding dress strip and even a street walker character. But Elling got frustrated by other performers stealing her routines. Because of this she decided to do something few others could mimic, an Afro act. "There weren’t that many black entertainers in Oregon at the time. Nobody could copy that". She also included singing into her routines which went down well with her audiences.

Elling's cool and elegant demeanour earned her much praise in the burlesque community and opened doors, taking her to places other black performers had been denied. She toured the U.S Canada and even took her act as far as Japan.

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There were many amazing performers to choose from while researching this post, it's worth mentioning a couple more who caught my eye; the statuesque Ethelyn Butler who used exotic dancing as a bridge to ballet...

 ..and the exquisite Sahji Jackon who appeared in a movie alongside Dizzy Gillespie. Both of these ladies must have fantastic back stories, yet I could find little about them!

It was good to learn how diverse burlesque was (and still is), but eye opening to see how little non white performers get to be in the lime light. I'm really glad that on the whole these women took control of their careers and images and made names for themselves. I think they deserve as much applause as possible.

Next time I'll delve into the girly magazines of the vintage era to see how the black Pin Up was represented in the age of Bettie Page and her colleagues.

The Hidden Pin Up #1 - The Black Pin Up

Following on from my post about the Vogue Ball introducing work I will be doing with Manchester dance troupe The House Of Ghetto I've begun to look into the history of the black pin up which will be the project's starting point.

Obviously, I adore the Pin Up and when speaking of the Pin Up I refer to models, dancers and performers who have all appealed to popular culture through their work and mass produced image. I have even painted pin ups myself in the past. Yet pin ups are almost always shown as white women. It seems the Western world never quite managed to embrace the idea of other races having a sexual identity. The Pin Up's black sibling (and for that matter Hispanic or any other race) is majorly under represented in mainstream popular culture. 

That's not to say that the beloved Pin Up hasn't donned the apparel of other cultures, but she's hardly given those cultures any agency or freedom of expression. She was simply play acting and appropriating cliched ideas.

Despite the lack of portrayal in the Western world, the black female form has long had a power to fascinate the Western audience. Going back as far as the early 19th Century we can find the example of Sara Baartman. 

Born in the Cape Colony (present day South Africa)  Baartman was a Khoikhoi woman who was exhibited as a freak show attraction because of her unusually large buttocks. Her 'performance' drew huge crowds across England (where she was baptised in Manchester Cathedral) and France, where she eventually died at the young age of 29. After her death her skeleton and body cast were put on display at the Natural History Museum in Angers. 

I understand it is a far leap to put Baartman in the story of the black Pin Up yet she holds an important place in terms of non white women being seen as more 'exotic', animal-like and sexually primitive by white audiences. She wasn't accepted as a 'normal' woman because of her different physical qualities, she was an oddity and her threat was minimalised by making an example of her. This is something to bear in mind when thinking of how the black woman's image has been represented in popular Western culture through the ages.

Moving forward a century, most people will have heard of Josephine Baker and her 'Danse sauvage' where she thrilled the audiences of the Folies Bergere dancing in her famous banana skirt. Baker embraced the things that made her stand apart from the Western ideal, and unlike the upsetting and unsettling story of Baartman, she was able to freely exploit Western notions of the primitive woman to her own advantage. Often referred to as The Black Pearl,The Bronze Venus and The Creole Goddess, Baker created a colourful parody which gained her money, fame and lasting notoriety. Her legacy was to create a shift in how a black woman could hold the power to her sexuality whilst being objectified.

As technology evolved and took hold of the entertainment industry, performers from the burlesque scene became popular fixtures in Hollywood musicals. One such talent from the chorus line was Jeni LeGon. 

Jeni LeGon (see more @gemma_parker_artist)

Dancing from the age of 16 for the Count Basie Orchestra, LeGon had a distinctive gangly style both acrobatic and comedic. She was soon spotted and whisked to Hollywood to appear in her first film Hooray For Love in 1935. As she credits herself, 'I had moves that were typically men’s moves because they were so technically difficult - flips, splits, cartwheels - I could do it all'. No one else offered the particular package LeGon could and because of this she broke new ground as a black woman singing and dancing in mainstream Hollywood films pre the likes of Lena Horne and Dorothy Dandridge.

You can see her technical ability and sweet girlish style on the screen as she performs alongside Fats Waller and Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson. Yet despite the film's success leading to a contract with MGM, her dancing career on film was short lived. She was so skillful she outshone the white leading ladies and soon MGM couldn't find a project suitable for her. She was pigeonholed into typically black roles such as the grass skirt wearing dancer in Swing Is Here To Stay (1936) or increasing, during the 1940's, as a housemaid. It is sad to think of all that frenetic talent going to waste. 

It's interesting to note the difference in how LeGon was represented as the savage black woman to how Josephine Baker chose to do it. LeGon had no authority over her image in this scene. Unlike Baker her control has been taken away so she becomes a 2 dimensional cartoon, another minimalised black stereotype with no sexual identity and no threat.

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Jeni LeGon had varied success in her career and, as with most true greats, her talents weren't fully appreciated until much later in life. There is a brilliant article where you can read more about her highs and lows HERE . 

While researching the black Pin Up I hope that my brief notes give some context to the power of the images that these women left behind.
Join me next time where I'll be looking into the past at the little known stars of the black burlesque scene through the 1950's and 60's.

The Vogue Ball

Later this month I'll be attending the Vogue Ball in Manchester where I am sure I'll die and go to heaven! 

The Vogue ball is a stunning happening of expression art and culture, it features dance troupes battling it out for glory any damn way they can, and if the videos of past balls are to be believed it will truly take my breath away! Drag, burlesque, dance, costume and high fashion, my pulse is racing just writing about it!

Manchester's own House of Ghetto will be performing this year. A troupe of black female dancers whose House Mother, the award winning dancer and choreographer, Darren Pritchard points out I need to see! We chatted for some time about the historic relevance of black female performers and concluded troupes like the House of Ghetto wouldn't be here if they didn't have the heritage of black female performers that went before them. That includes burlesquers, models and dancers, the black pin up girls from the past. 

Darren Pritchard in Vogue mode (see more @gemma_parker_artist) 

Today it could seem odd to think that black women were under represented in these fields when we have Beyonce and her contemporaries ruling the music industry, however as the pin up girl gained popularity through the decades, the black pin up took a back seat and became something of an underground phenomena. 

The black pin up is my starting point for art work I'll be collaborating on with Darren and The House of Ghetto and I am so excited to start learning more about this subject. There is a rich history of black pin ups that has gone unnoticed or even disregarded running parallel to the likes of the gorgeous Bettie Page and Marilyn Monroe. I'll be exploring the history of the black pin up in the run up to the Vogue Ball so keep your eyes open to learn with me!

In the meantime take a look at the amazingness that is the Vogue Ball last year. I am so excited to see this with my own eyes! ahhhhhh!

The Chantilly Belles on the silver screen!

Yesterday The Chantilly Belles were filmed for the new summer exhibition coming soon to The Lowry!
The theme of the exhibition is dance and we are so made up to have been asked to get involved and promote burlesque as an art form!
As we have our own unique take on this subject it's always been important to us to show that there is much more to burlesque than just stripping.

The day began with film maker Hilary Easter Jones and her trusty camera man meeting us at my art studio in Islington Mill where some of the filming took place. After being interviewed we were filmed performing in the Mill's club space. The setting was industrial which gave it a look of shabby chic; and with the stage properlly lit and the smoke machine the finished product looked amazing, something like cabaret meets Dragons Den!
We cannot wait to see the film when it's on show, here's some details about the exhibition:

Express Yourself - A family dance exhibition
Fri 10 April 2009 - Sun 27th 2009

“There are shortcuts to happiness, and dancing is one of them.”

Join your family and friends on the dance floor and launch yourself feet first into The Lowry’s first family dance exhibition. Find out about everything from ballet to breakdancing, line dancing to The Lasso, and appreciate the hard work, skill, creativity and dedication of some of the greatest dancers and choreographers of the last 100 years.

Free Entry