Within the house of just a few years, Taipei Popcorn, the creation of New Zealander Nick van Halderen, has grow to be one among Taiwan’s most well-known drag queens. From acting at underground golf equipment to doing photograph shoots for Vogue Taiwan, performing in artwork movies, and lecturing on the island’s most prestigious universities, Popcorn’s rise has been irresistible and irrepressible. Ron Hanson spoke to Popcorn about their uncommon journey.
It was at an digital music competition on the east coast of Taiwan, Van Halderen says, {that a} startling creature got here into their head. That being would grow to be often called Taipei Popcorn. The 12 months was 2017, and Van Halderen, then residing in Japan, was visiting the island to reconnect with their Taiwanese then-boyfriend Henry.
Backpacking throughout Taiwan, Van Halderen ventured to Organik Competition in Hualien, the place they might have an evening of sudden transformation. “It was a deep psychological state and bodily expertise,” they are saying. “I had this particular person come into my head, this creature. It was Popcorn.”
On the seaside, Van Halderen encountered a girl dancing. “Her title was Lisa, which is similar title as my twin sister. She was bald, and I used to be bald, so we had been each operating round like these two bald creatures. She had all these wigs, and we had been enjoying with them. And in some unspecified time in the future, I had a sticker placed on my head that mentioned ‘erotic popcorn’.”
That night time, Van Halderen, who had an academic background in industrial design however no prior stage expertise past highschool theatre, decided that they might enter the world of drag queen efficiency. That ambition would grow to be a actuality later that 12 months when Van Halderen moved to Taiwan and Taipei Popcorn was born.
The title is multi-layered in that means. It refers back to the exploding of gender norms and binary definitions but additionally references the private transformation Popcorn would expertise upon arriving in Taiwan. Latent power was set to blow up into infinite and unpredictable baroque types.
Taiwan was at the moment present process a dramatic wave of cultural change. In 2019, it might grow to be the primary place in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage. There was an accompanying growth of inventive and artistic expression round fluid gender and non-binary sexual identification, a queering of Taiwanese inventive and widespread tradition.
Taipei Popcorn on the Vogue Ball Pawnshop. Credit score: MW Studio
“That massive queer change that was occurring and the political motion was one of many huge causes for Henry and I to maneuver to Taiwan and arrange a life there,” Popcorn says. “We each felt there was one thing huge and historic occurring, and we needed to dwell amongst and be a part of it. I feel it is a large draw for lots of the LGBT overseas and abroad Taiwanese neighborhood. Taiwan is a magnet for us.”
For Popcorn, it was a dramatic shift. “I had been in Japan for 3 years, and I sort of went again within the closet,” they are saying, “as a result of I used to be educating on this very conservative small city and faculty. Japan has no anti-discrimination legal guidelines, so that you may be fired for being homosexual or trans.”
“All this power had constructed up, and that’s the place Popcorn got here from. It was sort of like a kernel that had constructed up bursting — POP! — a second the place all this queer power got here streaming out of me. I used to be simply beaming rainbows at that competition, and I spotted I have to cease hiding myself.”
Popcorn moved to Taipei to be with Henry, who had returned to town after additionally residing in Japan. Two years later, they might journey again to New Zealand collectively and marry. The wedding is now acknowledged in Taiwan. Theirs is an uncommon love story. Each had hung out rising up in New Zealand. Henry, as a 12-year-old, moved from Taiwan to Christchurch. Popcorn, at age 11, left South Africa for Dunedin and is now a New Zealand citizen. However, the 2 by no means crossed paths in Aotearoa. As a substitute, they might meet at an underground homosexual membership in Osaka.
“It was a bar known as FrenZ FrenZy,” they are saying, “a really smokey and psychedelic hole-in-wall whose most important declare to fame was being visited by Woman Gaga years earlier than. It wasn’t love at first sight, haha, however we had some good dialog after which a bizarre date through which we had been each very guarded. We didn’t see one another once more for months till we bumped into one another at Osaka Delight. Then all the pieces clicked.”
Henry and Nick van Halderen at their marriage ceremony. Credit score: Frances Scott
Not lengthy after shifting to Taiwan, Popcorn made their first public look in drag at Taipei’s Delight Parade, the biggest occasion of its type in Asia. “I gathered collectively this blue look,” they are saying, “and did the Delight Parade in excessive heels.” The following day, Popcorn picked up a duplicate of the Taipei Instances, and there was a photograph of them on the entrance web page.
Issues flowed from there. Taipei efficiency artist Betty Apple contacted Popcorn and invited them to carry out at an occasion she was curating on the Nationwide Museum of High-quality Arts in Taichung. Apple was collaborating with the Tokyo artwork collective Chim↑Pom of their work Avenue on the Sixth Asian Biennial, which the museum was internet hosting.
As a part of the venture, Chim↑Pom requested Apple to create a Block Get together inside and outside the museum channelling Taiwan’s rebellious, inventive spirit. Apple invited Popcorn to carry out. “It was very trusting,” Popcorn says, “as a result of she’d by no means seen me carry out. She messaged me on Instagram. I used to be in Wellington on the time, simply visiting. She messaged me and mentioned, ‘Are you a drag queen?’ And I mentioned, ‘I may be.’”
Apple had an instinct that it might work. I spoke to her about Popcorn, with whom she has continued collaborating. “Popcorn has their very own distinctive aesthetic fashion,” she says, “filled with queer parts with a non-binary, science-fiction really feel. They collage ready-made objects onto their physique to create summary textures. Popcorn makes good use of their peak to remodel themself right into a conspicuous and lovely alien queen. Individuals can’t avert their gaze. It’s like listening to the sound of popcorn!”
Betty Apple and Taipei Popcorn at Delight 2020. Credit score: Wang Newton
On the night time of the Block Get together, Popcorn and others returned to Taipei. “All of us got here again to Taipei on a KTV [Karaoke] bus,” they are saying. “And we went to a homosexual celebration known as C.U.M, which was a giant factor right here. I used to be in full rainbow drag. I met Bouncy Babs, one of many stalwarts of the Taipei drag scene, and she or he booked me to carry out on the membership for the following month. I began acting at that celebration, and it simply grew from there.
“In some unspecified time in the future, we began doing our personal celebration known as Blush at a membership known as B1. It was a month-to-month celebration I held with Bouncy and Amily Givenchy, one other drag queen right here. We needed to go along with extra of a techno, underground really feel. Each month we needed to produce this fairly detailed drag present and put it on the market. Individuals began contacting me about events, festivals, and occasions. I began working with techno label Smoke Machine, and so they despatched me on a tour of Chengdu, Beijing, Hong Kong, and Hanoi.”
In 2020, a lot of the world was in lockdown, however Taiwan had remarkably made it by way of the primary 12 months of the Covid-19 pandemic principally virus-free, with out shutting down. It was the 12 months following the legalization of same-sex marriage, and queer occasions had been thriving, unencumbered by concern of the virus. To many, Taiwan gave the impression to be a queer utopia. Trying again at social media posts from the time, even its members appear to be pinching themselves that it was actually occurring.
In October of that 12 months, Popcorn starred in an elaborate large-scale theatrical efficiency on the opening night time of Taipei Style Week. Organized by Vogue journal, Style’s Night time Out was an interactive and immersive theatre occasion merging style and artwork in accordance with a theme of dystopian finish instances. The occasion featured efficiency artists, dancers, a circus crew, and fashions sporting garments by native designers.
Popcorn at Taipei Style Week. Credit score: HIW
Popcorn appeared as a prophet/queen who’s first stalked and harassed by the opposite characters. Fearful initially of this splendidly unnerving creature, the others come to worship the queen. The efficiency ends in a wild ritual with Popcorn, sporting “futuristic drag Pisces couture” created by Taipei designer B Drag, commanding centre stage behind a classic standup microphone and surrounded by a frenzied harum of dancers.
Subsequent 12 months, Popcorn will make their full-length film debut. Popcorn is co-starring in Future Shock, a movie by director Su Hui-Yu, alongside award-winning actress Wu Ke-Xi. The three held a press convention in late 2021 to announce the venture, which was lined extensively by the Taiwanese mass media.
The movie options Wu because the final human on earth who discovers that his (Wu performs a male position within the movie) grim current is definitely a dystopian future that had been precisely predicted by futurist Alvin Toffler in his 1970 e-book of the identical title, Future Shock. Receiving a message from the previous, Wu’s character units out to seek out the e-book. Alongside the best way, there are a variety of psychedelic scenes. Popcorn’s position, Su tells me, is that of an omnipresent metaphysical being. “Generally they appear like God; generally they seem evil within the human’s dream; generally they’re a pc from the long run.”
Popcorn has labored beforehand with Su on quite a few events. The director, who creates work usually coping with queer tradition and physique politics, has forged Popcorn in his brief movies, which have been screened at movie festivals and exhibited as installations in artwork museums all around the world. Popcorn in these initiatives doesn’t strictly seem in drag. “I feel he likes to work with me,” Popcorn says, “as a result of I can rework into all these completely different creatures.” Certainly, Su tells me he admires Popcorn’s “plasticity”.
After I first spoke to Popcorn, they had been in Taipei making ready to return to New Zealand for a long-awaited vacation. We continued our dialog as they processed the reverse tradition shock of returning residence. At first, all the pieces felt “very overseas”, however they had been “easing again into the move”. After years of frenetic exercise, Popcorn says they’re in want of a psychological and bodily break, particularly after a latest bout with Covid, which left them drained.
Henry and Popcorn photographed collectively in 2020. Credit score: Manbo Key
“It’s actually satisfying and fulfilling placing on all these exhibits,” they are saying, “nevertheless it’s positively demanding. A lot of hours liaising with organizers, rehearsing, music mixing, hours and hours of costume preparation, after which, after all, the entire ritual of moving into drag on the night time: heavy make-up, corsets, excessive heels, and chunky jewels, normally worn for hours in crowded areas till the early hours of the morning.”
However after a break, Popcorn expects they’ll be hungry for extra. “I would go to Vietnam on the finish of this 12 months and do one thing once more in Hanoi. I need to reconnect with individuals. I made all these connections proper earlier than the pandemic, made all these mates, and we nonetheless comply with one another on a regular basis and preserve involved. I need to go and meet all these communities and carry out in these little underground areas. I need to attempt to do some drag in New Zealand. I’m linked with among the drag queens in Auckland through Instagram.
“My hope for the long run,” they are saying, “is to be based mostly extra between New Zealand and Taiwan and attempt to join the 2 extra. I need to preserve pushing artwork and efficiency additional and meet plenty of inventive and fascinating individuals. Long run, although, my husband and I wish to have just a little cottage within the mountains the place we will develop greens, preserve chickens and bees, and dwell a quieter life. However proper now, we’re younger and need to preserve having fun with town, the nightlife, and all of the alternatives and pleasure that brings us.”
Banner picture: Taipei Popcorn at Taipei Style Week. Credit score 草字.頭
– Asia Media Centre
