As anyone who watches RuPaul knows, “Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, Talent” are essential qualities in a worthy performer. Chanel Victor, who shoots diverse performers in an ongoing series, captures similar fabulousness. The emerging Paris-based photographer began her creative journey on the other side of the lens. Victor pursued acting in French TV and film for eight years, “but, you know, the industry here is so white, so gate-keeping,” she laments. “All I wanted to do was to express myself. They kept giving me these roles of, OK… act like the Black girl.”

The reductive nature of the entertainment industry led to an artistic crisis; Victor turned to painting. Hockney was a source of inspiration, especially when she realised he was also a photographer, and followed his lead. “I love his Polaroids; I did the same,” she says. “I bought a Polaroid, and I started shooting my friends.” Polaroids turned into film photography, then digital. Today, her visionaries include Nan Goldin (“I bought my ticket for the first day,” she enthuses of Goldin’s current show at the Grand Palais in Paris) and Helmut Newton. “Some people would find that …mmmm,” she says of Newton, but “his shots are aesthetically impressive, technically impressive.” Moreover: “Be bold – I take that from him as well.”

When she started, Victor began with nudes, “because I was feeling vulnerable,” she admits. She shifted when she understood vulnerability didn’t have to have a one-to-one relationship with being naked. “It’s also something in the eyes – somebody opening the door to you. It’s massive trust.” That trust has to be earned, but she found performers to be especially magnetic because they excel at showcasing their sense of self. 

One of them, Masha Kils, was involved in cabaret; their shoot became a defining one for Victor. As soon as Kils posted an image by Victor online, “all these performers came my way”, she says of what she deems a collective, supportive and ultimately close-knit scene, unfurling in Paris and its outskirts at places like La Gaité Lyrique, Communal, and Cirque Éléctrique. “It could be very underground,” Victor says of the venues, but also, “it could be in a restaurant – they start dancing on the tables.” She cites Venus Noire, a Black queer troupe, as especially captivating for “reclaiming their Blackness” in a way she praises as “highly political”.

Despite the inherent dazzle of a show, Victor often photographs performers at “off” hours, or within their homes, to examine “how their space is presented, how they carry themselves… [how] they carry their craft”. It’s an alternative to mid-show splashiness – even if, for these performers, “home is also backstage and onstage.” She’s photographed the first female MC of Crazy Horse, lying on a gold bedspread with an issue of Playboy, and a finalist of Drag Race France sporting an enormous curly wig and a red-and-magenta sheer robe (above).

Balancing glamour and labour, Victor figures out the sweet spot between intimacy and performing persona. Without dimming the allure of performance, Victor’s perspective is one of demystification, creating a mellow kind of accessibility. One trans burlesque performer, Mona LaDoll, made this especially clear for Victor: “glam was not just about the costumes – it’s about the attitude.” When Victor arrived, Mona was smoking in her kitchen while chatting on the phone, wearing a tank top with her own name. In anticipation of the shoot, Mona went into her bedroom, started doing her makeup, “and then was like I don’t care. I’m fab.” And she is: wearing rollers and red lipstick, track pants and tattoos, her insouciance is radiant.

Talking to her subject before shooting is a critical step for Victor. “I’m also the stylist,” Victor says. She likens it to “two friends just playing dress up after open conversations”. She features precise postures and a relationship to colour that painting helped cultivate. “I like sharp photos, sharp eyes, this massive aura.” She wants the result to feel good for both parties, the photographer and the subject. “It's for both of us,” she reasoned. “It’s [their] face.”

Although based in Paris, Chanel also spent time in New York City amidst a scene that felt markedly different, photographing models, showgirls, and dancers on the Myrtle Avenue Local subway, in front of the Statue of Liberty, in their downtown Manhattan apartments, or at model Aweng Chuol’s birthday party with Alex Consani in attendance. “The pace in New York was super intense, so the sense of connecting was completely different,” she says. In Paris, by comparison, the models granted her more time to exchange. “Here, you come more casually, and you have access gradually.”

As for places she dreams of shooting? She wants to capture the underground dance hall scene and carnival in the Caribbean – she’s from Dominica and grew up in Martinique. She is keen to do something about her own roots, to showcase her family: “something less performative”, in this case, inspired by “old family photos from the 70s”. And there’s also Thailand, where she wants to shoot sex workers “who also find joy in performance”. She visited the country a couple of years ago, “but the camera was on me,” she laughs of her pre-photographer era. “I was doing selfies.”

Follow Chanel Victor here for updates and future projects.