Willson, J orcid.org/0000-0002-1988-1683 (2020) Tricity Vogue's 'Blueing Up' as Sedimented Resistance: Extravagant Costume and the Expanded Field of Dressing Up. Studies in Costume & Performance, 5 (2). pp. 175-190. ISSN 2052-4013
Abstract
My focus in this article is to understand the way theatrical costume is performed in subcultural cabaret spaces, specifically The Blue Lady Sings Back by London-based cabaret singer Tricity Vogue. This show premiered at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern in the area of Vauxhall in South London that already has an embedded history of hedonistic pleasure. With reference to Dorita Hannah’s ‘expanded’ notion of costume as a ‘body-object-event’ and Jasbir Puar’s broader understanding of categories of race, gender and sexuality as events and bodily encounters, I seek to understand the way theatrical feminine costume enfolds dissident and marginalized histories of resistant urban space and site. In this show, Tricity Vogue undertakes multiple costume changes that embody various histories and contexts of cabaret performance: as Bollywood dancer Madhuri Dixit, as a European Marlene Dietrich-like cabaret singer and as a Josephine Baker-esque character in a banana skirt. All of this whilst wearing a blue stocking and blue body paint, effectively ‘blueing’ up. This steps into an uncomfortable territory in what could be seen as cultural appropriation, racial stereotyping and speaking for others. This concern also has currency within the contemporary burlesque community who are acutely self-conscious and politicized as regards this kind of costume and performative appropriation. Sara Ahmed’s conceptualization of feminist killjoys (2017) will be employed to better understand these difficult conversations about dressing up with Aoife Monks’ (2010) discussion of multiple costume changes being used as a strategy for ‘undoing’ stereotypes and rethinking a feminist ‘we’. By also drawing on diva studies, which builds on Lauren Berlant’s concept of ‘diva citizenship’, and postcolonial feminism, I will argue that the costumed cabaret body becomes a medium for women to politicize and reframe pleasure through the costumed spectacle of cabaret’s various erotic and exotic muses.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Editors: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2020 Intellect Ltd. This is an author produced version of an article published in Studies in Costume & Performance. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | blueing up; burlesque; costume appropriation; gesture; intersectionality; peekaboo; space/site |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > Performance and Cultural Industries (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 18 Sep 2020 10:53 |
Last Modified: | 04 Mar 2023 01:52 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Intellect |
Identification Number: | 10.1386/scp_00024_1 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:165596 |