The Brag

Gallery Burlesque
A Very Bawdy Birthday
By Natalie Amat

It all began with a delicious pin-up photography project called <i>Better Than Cheesecake</i>. Four years ago, Onur Karaozbek created Gallery Burlesque, which was first housed at the Gaffa Gallery before moving to Tone, finally settling into The Standard earlier this year. The kinky collective has been bringing the finest in neo-burlesque performance art, music and photography to Sydneysiders ever since, and now they’re celebrating the only way they know how – with a killer, knees-up party.

Sydney has proved a bit of a tough nut to crack for solo performance artists, as putting on shows can be a pretty pricey endeavour. Karaozbek’s solution was to curate group exhibitions in various Sydney hotspots. “To spice things up I decided to create a variety night full of music, visual art and burlesque,” he tells me. The first show had an interesting lineup, with “old-school magic man Rod from Sydney Show Boat, and the wonderful Kitty Van Horne with a burlesque routine.”

This month, Gallery Burlesque is kicking it old school with a fabulously decadent 4th Birthday Bash, promising what Karaozbek insists will be, “The biggest and best burlesque party Sydney has ever seen” featuring more than 15 performers, such as buxom beauties Lulu, Defy, Danica Lee, Holly J’aDoll, Rita Fontaine, Betty Grumble, Herbie Strangelove, Sheena Miss Demeanour and many more. “Looking at the line-up, I sort of realised I might have overbooked this thing… but hey, it’s a party after all!” So what can punters expect from the bash, besides some of the greatest neo-burlesque in town? “[We’ve] got cakes, huge disco balls, a star from the past, ladies dancing to Prince’s ‘Cream’, sing-a-longs, phat beats, a puppet, ponies… and many more! You just have to be there to experience it all.”

It hasn’t all been feathers and silk over the last few years, but the tough times have brought the Gallery Burlesque family a little closer. “I had times when I didn’t pay my rent so I could pay performers, and with such gestures I have gained a new kind of family. I have learned that acting as a community is better on every level than pretending to be a burlesque business.”

Gallery Burlesque has put on some dazzling themed nights that have proved exceptionally popular, such as the Harry Potter Parody and the Tim Burton Tribute Night. When it comes to selecting themes, is it something done in consultation with performers, or is it all up to the boss? “In the beginning it was more based on variety nights with loose themes, booking performers based on their own creations. In recent times I started to curate and direct the concepts and overall themes, working closely with performers that have the knowledge and understanding of the topics that I choose.” But there was one theme that got away. “I am a total Star Wars nerd, but the brilliant Russall S. Beattie of The Vanguard fame tackled [the theme] first with great success, and with much respect he will have it forever, and I’ll keep it in my dreams. We are a small community in Australia, and my view is to respect each other’s work and not try to poach each other’s concepts.”

With such a push for originality, Karaozbek must have some exciting themes up his sleeve for the future. “Taking things one step forward will be the Tarantino vs. Rodriguez Experience that I will put on in 2013,” he explains, “where I am writing/scripting all the acts and cutting/editing the music to it, including short flicks and puppeteers.” Keep your ear to the ground for details of a possible The Bride vs Cherry Darling number…

What: Gallery Burlesque 4th Birthday Bash
Where: The Standard
When: Sunday October 21, Doors at 7PM
More: Tickets for just $30, from galleryburlesque.com