Androgenicity

Posted by Adriel Contreras in Students

Angelo Giusti and Malcom Morgan are very positive about the involvement of students in their club.

Androgenicity is a  newly formed club  at the Santa Fe University of Art and Design dedicated to the great art and theatrics of dressing in drag and putting on a show. The club aims at breaking the ice with a hammer, and

showing its members how to entertain as well as provoke an audience to consider the circumstances of gender. Through Androgenicity, members and supporters will work throughout the semester to produce a Drag show.

This club is headed by student ambassador Gelo Guisti, whose alter ego, the fabulous Miss Gelato, has become a regular presence on campus from school-hosted events to simple walk arounds. Miss Gelato struts around with thick heels and deep eyeshadow. Her pale complexion and often vivid attire and wigs explode along with her personality. As Gelo sees his alterego, Miss Gelato is very much a dear character of his own person, which exists on her own with her own variation of personality.

This past week I had the pleasure of sitting down with both Gelo and Malcom Morgan, the club administrator as well as a very proactive enrollment advisor of the Performing Arts students. Over the last week, Androgenicity held its first meeting and appointed cabinet members for the club: President Gelo Giusti; Vice President Isaac Navaro; Secretary Mariah Faye; Treasurer Jake Oliver and Historians Bythe C. Brooks and Lauren Eubanks. According to Malcom Morgan, these students will learn to manage their positions in the club and develop strengths in leadership and organization.

One of the heavier questions that I asked Gelo and Malcom is what drag means to them. A general consensus between the two is that drag is a form of art in which one builds up a character.

“We are taking these structures and just breaking them apart. We are going to play with colors and do what we want,” Gelo says, noting that the art form is very much about revolutionizing ideas around identity and the self.  “I see drag as transgressive, as a form of punk.”

As a drag queen or drag king, one portrays an exaggeration of gender and in doing so one dresses across from his or her own gender. The club looks to explore these distinctions and to prepare members to feel comfortable in their drag. Malcom finds beauty in his self expression and recalls the adoration of a friend’s mother as an initial step in feeling comfortable in drag when she told him: “‘Malcom, you’re beautiful, take risks, use color, use color! Did I tell you to use color.'”

Ultimately, drag should be an expression of the self and identify—exploration and questioning gender boundaries are perfect conditions to spark the desire to drag; feeling comfortable and outrageous are necessary.

Androgenicity members also have their eyes on community involvement during the semester. They are looking to produce their shows with an open door to anyone. They will most likely prepare for a show coming up in the next few months. More will be posted as dates are solidified.

At the conclusion of the interview, Gelo quoted the famed drag queen Rupaul, who said: “We’re born naked, and the rest is drag,” because this line very much strikes at the core of what drag exemplifies. Free expression. Ane are all born without the notions of gender and life puts it upon us to dress us to certain standards. Androgenicity hopes to break these conventions.