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Rainbows And Glitter: Photos From Texas Queerlesque Festival.

Burlesque Performers From All Around Performed At Sue Ellens And Viva’s Lounge As Part Of Texas Queerlesque Festival This Past Weekend.

All Photos by Allan Hayslip

What’s life without a lot of glitter and dancing?

More than 60 performers from around Texas and around the country converged on Viva’s in Dallas this weekend, joining about 500 attendees for the second annual Texas Queerlesque Festival.

The four-day event kicked off Thursday with a Sparkle Party followed by Rhinestone Riot Friday and capped off with a Rainbow Revolution Showcase Saturday night.

The final event was a Sunday morning brunch followed by a keynote address from one of the festival’s headlining performers, Washington D.C.-based GiGi Holliday.

In between the festive bookends were a couple of days filled with classes as part of “Unicorn School,” where festival registrants were able to drill-down into the fundamental mechanics of performance staples like glove-peels and applying glitter-based makeup, or basic moves on the floor and in the air. Other classes were expansive, discussing how to craft and maintain characters and personas, or how to weave politics or activism into succinct personal story lines. And there was guidance on how to tie it all together with written content, and implementing it via a social media strategy.

Each night featured three headlining performers as well as a cavalcade of numbers from performers and troupes from Dallas, Austin, Fort Worth, San Antonio, Houston, Amarillo and generous contingent from out of state.

With as many as nine solo-performers per act, and three acts per night, the two intermissions per show were welcome opportunities for people to smoke, use the restroom, or hit the bar. Many availed themselves of the two photo booths that uploaded directly to the Festival’s Facebook page, or browsed among the ring of vendors who sold riding crops, canes, signed posters and photos, pasties, make-up, head-dresses, and sex-toys. Each show also included a raffle of an array of vendor and sponsor-provided goodies with the proceeds to benefit two charities, Lambda Legal and and Allgo.

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