The title of this recording is "Kym Strathdee profile". It is described as: Since the 1970s Kym Strathdee has photographed queer events and people around the world - including in Auckland, Wellington, Sydney, Melbourne and San Francisco. It was recorded in Aura Hotel, 95 Manners Street, Wellington on the 17th June 2022. Kym Strathdee is being interviewed by Gareth Watkins.  Their names are spelt correctly but may appear incorrectly spelt later in the document. The duration of the recording is 1 hour and 39 minutes. A list of correctly spelt content keywords and tags can be found at the end of this document. The content in the recording covers the decades 1950s through to the 2000s. A brief summary of the recording is: This summary outlines the core elements from an extensive recorded interview with Kym Strathdee by Gareth Watkins, which was conducted at Aura Hotel, Wellington, on June 17th, 2022. The interview delves into Strathdee's life experiences, reflections, and the social history of the LGBTQIA+ community in Aotearoa New Zealand across multiple decades, starting from the 1950s. Strathdee begins by discussing a tumultuous childhood characterized by constant movement between foster homes and countries, including Fiji. These experiences were initially sources of pain but later transformed into a grounding in diversity and cultural understanding that informed their resilience and worldview. The 1950s Auckland that Strathdee grew up in was a melting pot of cultures, predominantly Māori, which heavily influenced their early perspectives on life. The interviewer, Watkins, prompts Strathdee to describe this era and its impact, including their observations of everyday life, community, and emerging understanding of queer identities. Strathdee recalls an impactful figure from their youth, Victor Motu, whose confident self-expression in a conservative time left a lasting impression. Strathdee's engagement with Christianity brought both a sense of belonging and an eventual disillusionment as they grappled with the church's views on queer identities. This internal conflict steered Strathdee towards advocacy for inclusivity, particularly within the LGBTQIA+ community and in their current work supporting people with disabilities. During the 1950s and beyond, awareness of and attitudes towards queer people evolved, accompanied by personal experiences of inappropriacy, cultural expressions, and burgeoning political activism. The narrative shifts to explore Strathdee's involvement in the diverse queer landscapes in Auckland and Wellington, including their immersion in nightlife, venues such as the drag nightclub 'Talk of the Town,' and their interactions with prominent figures like Carmen Rupe and other entertainers. The emergence of the gay community as a more visible and cohesive entity is discussed, alongside the tensions between inclusivity and exclusion. Strathdee reflects on personal milestones, such as leaving the church and training in psychiatry, which further accentuated their commitment to social justice and support for marginalized groups. Photography emerges as a central theme in Strathdee's life. Self-taught and pragmatic, they describe capturing moments and people that resonate with them, rejecting technical prowess for the fulfillment of recording fleeting interactions and vivid realities. Strathdee's practice is inclusive, preferring candid shots over staged portraits and valuing the authentic over the contrived. The interview concludes with Strathdee's thoughts on community documentation and the power of preserving the lived experiences of individuals, both those triumphant and the everyday. They reflect on the significance of legacy, loss, and the ways in which both personal and collective histories are pieced together through shared and archived narratives, emphasizing the role of such records in honoring and remembering the essence of people and moments long past. The full transcription of the recording begins:  I'm Kim and I was born right back in 1950 and had quite because it has a perspective on how I find the world. I lived in a very misplaced family and lived in lots of foster homes that was fostered out to Fiji and different places, which I felt quite wounded about when I became a teenager and an adult and not feeling part of the family proper. However, um, in later years, I credit that same experience as being experiencing diversity and embracing and finding things about other cultures and other people and other perspectives and other ways of life. So I guess my buoyancy in a lot of things has come from the fact that turning what used to be wounds into being openings can you describe or set a scene what it was like in the 19 fifties? You you You're talking about Auckland, Is it? Yeah, I'm talking about pre once. Were warriors Auckland State advance when I was there and I mean, most of my foster homes were, um, around that area as well. So it was. It was a large percent percentage Maori. So a lot of my first concepts on life came from a Maori perspective as opposed to which is great. We had later on being a a white boy who didn't get to university and decide to become aligned to things politically. Um, so I saw things from quite a Maori perspective. I was being a different child. I was very much an observer and probably at times too badly affected by my observations. Um, but yeah, it was It was I don't think where we grew up that we had obvious racism because we went to those parties we had. We didn't have funerals. Um, and we made jokes about Maori things as Maori, even though I was thinking so I was I was included in that kind of thing. Also, because I was a, you know, as my grandfather was was a Pentecostal Christian. And I felt safest, um, in that kind of environment for 18 to 22. And although I came away away from the guilt and all that stuff because I couldn't be doing what I'm doing now if I saw a Pentecostal Christian, but I learned about a lot about community and a lot about responsibility and in some ways that has shaped and sometimes formed criticisms of how we are when we call ourselves a gay community and we make a lot of people feel rejected. And so a lot of this comes out of my work because I work with in disability now, uh, with problem behaviours, and I am again get the chance I could do with Children. I get to experience their wonderment through their eyes. Um, being with disability people, especially because they're starting to come out in Queer Society now and we're still walking past them wanting to tap their wheelchairs, and but we would never invite them home. I'm gonna take you right back to the 19 fifties and you've mentioned words like queer and gay. And I wonder, were you aware of, um, what I would say would be Rainbow Communities Rainbow people Now, were you aware in the 19 fifties and of rainbow peop Um, not as such. I'd had four instances of adults doing inappropriate things, um, with me, which didn't actually damage me. I was fascinated at the time. It just scares people. It didn't make me gay. It didn't make me queer, didn't make me anything, just brought my attention to fascination and stuff like that. But, um, again, in that redneck, hardcore street that I lived in, there was Victor Mo, who was a Maori guy that lived around the corner. Respect of it. And Victor had walked down those streets, his head held high and his hair longer than pre Beatles down to his shoulder, teased back, combed. I knew it because the girls next door used to do that to their hair, and I could tell that's what he did, because I was an observer of colour and movement creation. I saw the girls doing it, but Victor did to, and Victor wore a boy's shirt tight, tight jeans, and he had it tied around, just underwear our breasts would be. And he was wearing a bra and he tied it and he minced down that street and he got people looking at him out the windows. My mother used to say, Oh, that boy, look at him. He's responsible for his mother's early death, and all I saw in my start world was colour movement and a head held high. I didn't know what that was. I didn't know it. Mum called it queer, but queer was a different word then. Queer wasn't necessarily a negative statement. Yes, it had ne negative in, like whatever that word is. But it meant a little odd. A little like you're not feeling well. You're feeling a little queer. It didn't necessarily have that sting and that fist that it came to be later on, that we had to reclaim. And so I heard that word. Um, I saw that, and I knew that I should not become Victor because that was not a an that was not an acceptable way to be. And with my church life, of course, that kind of people were having those kind of demons cast out and all that sort of bullshit. Um, so, yeah, I wasn't aware of that when I when I was 20 I I was, uh, a youth evangelist kind of person that would go out and run the ws of Auckland at night time and invite people back to the Teen Challenge coffee bar. And I was with my partner and we'd get all prayed up and I would go with our little stupid little tracks and the Lord will in these people. And we were on Princess Wharf 1969 1970. And our aim was to get those people to come to not a church. But we got a coffee bar with people who played guitars and you know, we so contemporary. And we walked along that wharf one night and three guys came walking towards us and they walked like Victor Moto only worse, because they were three and they were bouncing off each other. The guy's names David and was debia Richard, who was Rebecca, and I don't want the other one's name, but they were shrieking, and I had never seen anything like that. They were being so camp. A policeman approached them, and I heard one of them say to the policeman, Does your wife know that you're out chasing young boys around the street? And I'm like and I find out I I was getting entertained by the difference. I wasn't getting a hard on trying to have sex with those people. I wasn't thinking of that just their social impact, and they were just going, Oh, making these gay noises and and doing these and ballets and these were these were those founding people in Auckland that didn't set the style, but they broke the mould and life like it has so many times faced me with that, and I thought we should invite them. We should invite those go back. I think I was a bit entertained by them again. It wasn't a Penis talking. I just, you know, the Lord will win. I turned around to my co Christian, and I could tell he was drunk. Let's, you know, let's get out of here and I'm going. No, those two boys, it funny because I wasn't thinking of telling the story, and it's a really good story. I invited him to our coffee bar to get off the street on the boards. I didn't realise that Princess walk along that promenade between that and the ferry building. I know now it was a beach. I didn't know that. Then. That's where people went to meet somebody. There were a couple of talk of the town was a drag club by Turner, Tina Turner, tiny Tina, who's also known as Patrick Pat Crow, who also who ran the first kind of drag nightclub that I knew of in Auckland. Anyway, we got these boys came almost coming to the coffee bar, and we think, Oh, good. You know, we're like fish waiting for them to jump in the net. And David Devina, who introduced himself to and I I didn't even know that was a kind of comment, I I know, but Richard and Rebecca, they started giving me a few other ideas here, but, um, I'm pretty sure it was David Devina that said to me. So you think your God can change our life? Yeah. Yeah, you can. You know, I was all ginned up in that and he said, That's pretty arrogant and I never want to be arrogant. I was a Christian. What is he talking about? He said, you know nothing about my life. And he challenged me. The other guy I knew wasn't seeing them. Just as soon as he was seeing them as perverts III. I realised the difference, and I had an opening in my head that this was going later on embrace. It still wasn't thinking through my Penis. And this guy said to me, I'll make you a deal. I'll come to your coffee bar with you if you come to my club, my club tomorrow night, and I went. That sounds fair. It didn't sound fair. Any of the Christians that I had, They came to the coffee bar, and the next day I kept my word and my church word got around. I got run from my pastor. My church had a prayer meeting for the entire time I was at that nightclub. They stayed up till one o'clock and usually do that praying for me. And I just went, Well, what's the fuss about? If you believe in God, you know, God's gonna win. And I went to this first talk of the town nightclub that was on bottom of town in Auckland, and I went up there and I saw these people. I didn't know what it was at the time, but they were miming and they were wearing costumes made of sheets. And it was real down to earth stuff, and they were miming, and I just went, Oh, this is just like church where we're all speaking in James and going off, these people have got an outlet. Those weren't the words that I thought. Then this is the interpretation I have now. So that was my thank you. So eventually I That was the very thing that I that got me out of church eventually was that people regarded people as Christians or sinners. But these people were perverts, and I just went You can't make that kind of distinction. And I can't find your flag anymore. And, you know, Then I'd meet what weren't called that. Then Trans people and I was going. What happens? I'd say to church people, What are you gonna do when I bring somebody who's who's got a sex change to church? You can cast the demons out and like to I didn't necessarily ask those questions verbally, but I asked those questions always in my head. That's how I found life in the fifties when, uh, you left the church. Did you also leave religion? Or was it just that church? Um no. I. I left church. I left, um, the congregation because they were all in seeing me as being, and I moved to Wellington and the thing kept chasing me and turning up. Um, so when I left church, I really missed community. I couldn't just do it at the Gay Boys Club between da da da da da, because it it was my whole life. Um, so I knew I had to get out of Auckland. So I moved down to Wellington. I'd been working at Auckland Hospital as a special duty orderly, and I moved down here as a transfer to work at the hospital in Newtown, in the theatre block. And some crazy things happened where I was living and I just went, No, I don't want to do I've got to go and do something that means something and was sort of like the next Christian loophole. And so I went and trained in psychiatry at, um, hospital and that just I you know, it was that older brother thing in me that's got to keep giving back, and that might sound noble. It gets you in a lot more shit than what you realise. It's nothing to claim as being wonderful. I'm I'm glad it's benefited some of the people that I've been around, but you know you can't wear like a medal on you because it's got more of the pin that sticks into you and has got a medal that shines out. So that club in Auckland was it. So it's called top town. No talk of the town, the town, which is It was so it was so gay, draggy at the time, because Shirley Bassey had a hit album at the time called Live at the Talk of the Town. And so talk of the town was an English club where lots of gay revered artists perform like bass. So, you know, this was Auckland's talk of the town. It cost you $5 to get in. I maybe not $5. 02 dollars And you got a cup of coffee and everyone had something in their bag. I wasn't drinking at that stage, but, you know, I probably only went till about one o'clock in the morning, but that was like it was Bohemia. It wasn't as bohemia as I found Wellington, but it definitely wasn't going to church on Sunday. So this is late sixties. Were you photographing at the talk of the town? No, Um, I was, Although I was still hanging, I was a bit of a moth. I wasn't ready to be a butterfly. And I ha, I know I'd go with these guys so that because that's the only other outlet that I knew and I loved all that colour and movement. I was always colour and movement. My sister used to be a marching girl, my half sister. And so every Sunday we were dragged along to where Mum and Dad could drink in a tent and they call it marching and my sister and so pageantry, colour and movement had always appealed to me. But I also had different, so I'd never I don't think many people carried their cameras socially in those days. What used to happen was when you went to a nightclub. There was usually a roving reporter who took photographs of you and gave you a ticket. And you went and saw the proof sheets in some thing and you ordered those photos. That's how it was. I wish I had kept all those photos. But later on I went back to Christian living and decided, and I did take a lot of photographs not at talk of the town, but that period of time. When I went back to church, I decided that was, um, wasn't a really good road to keep to keep and thing, and I burnt all the photos from it, which was so yeah, don't burn your photos don't go removing people's Facebook files after they're dead because their legacy and their conversations and more important, and the thing not the who they were, is represented. I I'm not really good on the computer, but I've got a strong respect for our Maria in the sky. I've learned about so many people, not just people passing, but the wealth that we have back here in the homeland from the Facebook. And I know it's got and everyone's got much better systems and it's got, you know, it's got its faults and its flaws and all these ongoing restrictions. It's one of the best archives we have of our times of individual lives. And so, you know, I've heard quite a few people recently telling me they're about to close down someone's thing and I just go, Yeah, I'm sorry. It's just like burning a really good book. Um, I've got off the what? Your question was, how did you come to photography? How how did you How did you get your first camera? Ok, so this under the quick cloud of poor pita for me, Linda Ronstadt, Go. Um I my mother and her husband and their family never really got me, but I you know, I didn't fit the mould. Um, and they would buy things like one year. They gave me a great big guitar with one free lesson with a Pacific Island man and Glen in and I went to play to Spanish Harlem and never went back that I was not a musician. They didn't give it to a musician. They just did not know what to give me, or they gave me one of those pool sets that sit on the top of the table. It's only about a yard wide. You get the holes to go. I just That was my stepfather's game, not mine. And one year, totally accidentally, they gave me a grey plastic camera and I. I only had one film, and that's all I had. And I have three photos from that, that first shoot of my brothers or my half brothers and half sisters. Um, I didn't in those days, of course, people didn't keep their photographs or they had them in stuck, and I had a variety of albums over the years. You know, the ones you put the plastic sheet on. It removes all the colour out of the photographs and so many different types. Um and but I never learned photography again, academically different and not, you know, had to leave school really early to support my family and stuff. Yeah, I was so insecure as a person that building up any academic knowledge, including learning a camera which I still haven't done. People look at me and go Oh, what kind of equipment is that? And I have to show them the name because I Yes, I know it's a canon. I said, Do you know you can do such and such? And I've got no fucking idea I haven't. And and that has held me back. That's fed my dividends because I feel at times that I've a fake that I can't call myself a photographer as such. So people come up still to me now, and I'm still not trying to be humble. This is just how it is and they ask me. So you're a photographer? I'm actually holding a camera here. The answer is very obvious. But then I go straight to you. I don't know about that, but I take lots of photographs and so that photographer has always meant you've been I've been in a dark room, and that's I saw how the process is then. No, it's too lazy to learn it. And not only that, it was dark and dank and smelling of chemicals and not unlike a gay. So it really, um and I That wasn't my world. That was darkness. And it wasn't colour and light and movement, so yeah. No, I didn't. I didn't get the technical. And I went up from Instamatic camera instrument. So, you know, I'd go to a lot of where I worked in a factory and a lot of the Samoan boys would invite me to their weddings, And I'd take my camera and, you know, I could give them the photos free. And and I'd hate to see what those photos look like now. I mean, my composition probably is a lot better, but give me, um give me the balance of light and focus. And I'm not your man. Um and you know, So I you know, I've graduated. I I've lost, broken, mistreated. So many cameras and people look at me like you realise you don't know and so that that's that's just how they are. You know, they're quite disposable, but I don't want I. I don't want the prestige of being a photographer or having that equipment because a lot of people come to me now and this is just across the board and they go, What kind of camera is that? They say, Oh, yeah, Well, I'm saving up. And when I can get a I'm gonna get a A camera just like that, and I'm gonna start taking really good photos. And I went, Do you have Do you have a I call a mobile. Do you have a mobile? And I Yeah, I said, don't wait until you get the camera. If you're seeing photographs now, take the photograph. Anything you look at and this is only a recent realisation, maybe about nine months ago, that because somebody said so what makes you take a photograph? And I went Hm. It's probably anything I look at for more than two seconds. Not that I'll get all of those, but I'm impacted by things. And if I've got my camera, I'll probably take a photograph. Not because it'll make a spectacular photo, because indulgently, that's how I see things Can you recall? What were the first images you took? What did you take? My, um my stepsisters and my two stepbrothers. Um and part of that was it's quite weird. I've just gone all psychological on myself. Um, no, that was quite neat To capture them without me in an effort to belong to them at at then, you know, that's I was desperately wanting to become part of that and sanctum. And, you know, wherever I've gone and I'll go to gay bars still and just go, I haven't got the password, you know, I've got the right hair and it's on a for me. It's just like me. Maybe you don't want the pass routes anyway. And you know that keeps you moving because I don't wanna be. I don't wanna be, uh, a gay person or a straight person or a top or a bottom, because they're just the next cage and I find incredible life and wonderment in the eyes of little kids and really old people. And a lot of my photo archives are just about that and just old people and homeless people. And because there's just all these stories and we're privileged to go through this life just once. Yeah, I'm really glad that I've got this archive of the growth of a community that wasn't allowed to be in the past and now can marry who they want to and be celebrated at the thing. And I love now going to same sex weddings. And I also like going to straight weddings and anyone who meets each other, no matter what the gender, not our preferred gender and celebrating what they have. So your photographic archive give me a sense of, um, the span. Like what? What years does it span and kind of what's included in it. OK, so we'll talk about, um we're talking about the the queer side of it, and I use queer as a broad word than gay. Um, it doesn't always go with everybody else, but, you know, that's You didn't have a Mohawk and Pans, um, on the queer side of things, it spans some of those early drag queens. A lot of whom are now are angels who were entertaining us back there. Pat Crow. Tiny Tina, Samantha James. Um, I won't give you her male name because she might have seen something through the ceiling at me, um, so that they were in the 70 just 72 period, I guess, And then all through. So I was going to places like backstage in Auckland. I was also part of a group called As you Are who were tired of not having going and having drinks with your friends at somewhere like chat room and then it closing and the gay people going to the gay club and the straight people are only going to the straight club. And so, as you are, was a group of people in Auckland who went like, Let's just have our own club And they had their own parties, their own, and they were male and female, and they didn't lose any of the gay promiscuity at all. Everyone slept with everybody and they did a little reviews, and we had people like a male Samoan stripper, and we had tiny Tina and we had a variety of different people. So that that was, uh, as you are was the only, um, thing that you had. So I started. Then I started recording their history, their meetings, their etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. At the same time, my cousin from Papakura, who was a hairdresser who was so misplaced out there, and he would come to our place and dress up. And Donna de Paul was born, and Dana used to come in from Papakura and dress at our house and because we had no crimes, I have a problem with gay community that I'm gonna mention this because it's important there was a gay liberation dance at the university Raise funds for, you know, gay lib protests. And we my wife, my second wife at this stage and I had we didn't have any division about gay people. And, you know, it wasn't about me living two lives there, and it was just like, No, we were you know, we were We were anti Springboks or, you know, we were those freedom for everybody. People anchors sometimes. And we had Diana living with us, and there was a gay liberation dance, and it was a human right. That's why we went there. And we got there and it was $5 and I still see that trestle table in the hallway of Auckland University and there was a gay man sitting on a at the trestle table and he looked up to us and I saw his eyes. Because this is the thing. When you're a photographer, you're already an observer. The camera just gets your observations, correct or not Correct. But they are your observations. And I knew that he was looking at it. I could see where he was looking. And he was. I wasn't so arrogant to think he was looking at my big crotch, but, you know, he was looking at me holding hands and he turned around and went, Oh, do you know what this is? And that was his tone. And I went, Yeah, and he looked at us. He went it's gay liberation dance. And I went, Yeah, and handed them the $5 towards the cause. And he turned around and he said, If you're holding hands with a fish, you're straight and you shouldn't be here. And I was I learned this from that many years later that our acceptability, no matter who we are, is defined, controlled absolutely everything by our ability to accept, change the words around. If you're not able to accept other people and and we've got to be careful with that because we did have to fight, and we did have all those divisions. But we got to not be the divisions ourselves. And so when he said that and I looked at that thing and I went, how would you know? Anyway, how do you talk with a reference? A negative reference to a woman's body parts, which you haven't. OK, you don't even have the urge. But you wouldn't even take it on because it it it it It's something you don't know. Um and so I just It's like race, reverse, racism or thing. I just I didn't want him to just accept that I was bisexual or, you know, being straight I wasn't pretending to be anything at the time. I was just being, um and that we just got to be careful that we aren't the things that we despise in other people just got right off your question there. But there you go. You mentioned just before about, um, it's the photographer. It's the observations, and the camera just captures those observations. Do you feel as a photographer when you're at events that the camera is kind of removing you from that event with you? Because you are just being the observer. Uh, yeah, because my camera could go places that I can't go. I well, I I was at a dear friend, uh, wedding a month ago in and I got there and, you know, I'm still getting used to my eyesight in the public saying, and I just looked around and I went I should, you know, I've got my camera here, want to give them some photos of the thing. And I just looked around the crowd and I went, I can't do this. I I'm just polarised. Just I think I'll just have a drink and sit here and all of a sudden I found myself following my camera around the room, doing things that I wouldn't even do going up to people going. That's not your first date, is it? And sounding like the absolute confident person. So my camera having that camera didn't give me a licence to behave in a certain way. But it filled in for something that I can't quite often bridge myself. And I'll find myself going and doing it because we only come together like this once, and I don't process that, but I have that in my thoughts all the time as we now that I'm older and we've lost so many people and that we should not be wallowing in our loss about those people that we've lost. But we should value this today that we've got with each other. And we shouldn't make shit on other people because life's life's really, really precious and and, you know, I mean, if you look through the archive that I've got spanning about all those years, and I get people that come on to my site on my site on Facebook, who go Oh, I just love all your photographs. It's just a a shame. There's so many. We've lost so many. And yeah, we have. We must not let our loss become more important than what those people brought to our lives or what they brought to our community. And some of them were assholes. Yeah, sure, they're all, you know, black and white and all those kind of people. So yeah, I the camera does take it. The camera does. I mean, I've had to learn how to handle myself in front of, um in a gay club, sometimes because people walk up to me. And you know, this is back in the days where you had 36 photos on the family. Go take our photo. And I didn't know how to say no because I was there to photograph someone's show or something. And all I had was whatever film I was paying for and the developing thereof. And these people wanted to be instantly fabulous just for the photograph. They were never going to see the photograph. I had so many photographs on that thing of people that I just couldn't say no to. And it took me a long time to go. Oh, yeah, I'm actually here to do that. And then I'd get attitude through, not helping build someone's temporary plinth for the right now. I took a photograph of my boyfriend and it was like somebody they just met two minutes ago and I was part of that. And, um so, yeah, having a having a camera can be a mixed thing because people go. I hate the term official photographer or even photographer. I just want to be able to slink around and get life out of it is because as soon as people know they're being photographed, they change. And I love some of those product photos. But like the other side, I'm gonna give another example. And I will be unpopular in my angel cousin saying I am never gonna throw the pictures of my cousin out of drag the before drag mistakes during drag, et cetera, et cetera. Because I understand with drag that we are transporting to something that's gonna that we can be seen as rather than something that didn't fit us. But I see the value of that journey in all those photos. No, I wouldn't deliberately put pictures up. And you know, people have said to me, Oh, you don't put those fucking torture pictures up on me and I'd like to think I never would. But privately, there's a wealth in that journey and and we're not just the product. And we're not just, you know, that transfers to us not just walking down the street in a pride parade going. Look at me. Look at me. Look at me. No, we don't have to be turning ANZAC day where we're putting wreaths down to people that have died. But somebody paved those streets that we dance on and maybe it's my age and and seeing Victor Motor and how it was for him walking down the street. And I understand that our, uh that's not part of our present cultures experience, and we can't expect that they there were no good old days. There were our days, and these are their days and their days don't cancel out our days. You know, we just got to embrace what life gives us. I think it's really interesting, um, talking about tortuous photos because I I also think possibly that, um, photographs and and also audio recordings and other other types of media. They resonate differently as they age. So the immediate reaction to a photograph saying, Oh, that's tortuous may not be the reaction. 10 years, 20 years, 30 years down the track, it'll become vintage. It'll be a any any photographs. Look, I look at photographs. I was talking before about how people used to take your photographs in nightclubs and give you a ticket that worked somewhere else in Queen Street in Auckland. I remember as a little kid, and I've still got pictures of my grandparents. When you were walking down the street, a photographer we used to take that is the most Inc I would love to see. The archives of the Photographers wrote that, and they would give you a card. And if you wanted to, you'd go up and see the proof sheet and you get it and they'd post it to you two weeks later, and it would have a a wrinkly edge on it. It's a rated edge, and it would be in black and white or or a toing. And they are the photos of the fashion of that era, and we've got them in our we've got one or two of them in our old photograph album somewhere. And there's a whole archive. Those people. Yes, they were trying to make a buck and get through life, but they they fished the streams and and that's how life was on Auckland streets. You know, not not neglect because they didn't stop and get your photograph. They photographed you walking along and getting across and and the the some of the clothes you look at and go. Oh, that's fabulous. You know what people are gonna say about the same thing about that? And they're gonna point it all up and go. Can you believe people wore that? Yeah, yeah, because we're both hilarious. And we're timeless because somewhere deeper down the line, someone is gonna go to the pictures, even my album and going because I've had people come to me and going. Ah. Remember that party? Yeah. And I went Yeah. Yeah. And I remember I wore that. Da da da da And I'm going, You know, we change our memories change as we change and I go, I don't ever go. Hm? No, you didn't, but I go, Yeah, I've got photos of that knocked on the road and they'll look at me and going Oh, my God. Why did I wear those shoes and go? Because we always we all do. You know, we we've got this memory of either cringe or glory. Maybe not those extremes about something that's historically recorded us. And that has changed. And and we shouldn't. That's how we were. And that's how we fantastically were. And that brought us to here. So describe for me you're you're mentioning that you kind of like to slink, uh, when you when you're at events, describe for me how you go about um uh, going into an event and And how What? What? What does your eye get drawn to? And then what do you photograph, um, again, every midsummer carnival. Say that in Melbourne. I wonder why the hell I'm going and who the hell I think, Uh, I go through all that different factor, and then I get there and I'll usually start, But I don't have a plan. Definitely don't have a plan. I'll usually photograph the people who are volunteering. Yeah, the Christians, if you like the the people who support us. And there's something about volunteers that we too easily, especially in gay disposable society that we just take for granted. We just expect we bark at them. You know, we don't all do that. A lot of us are really appreciate it, But they we've met, and so I usually start there, and then someone will go pass and I'll be outrageously Look at me. Look at me. Look at me. And I was like, Let me get that magic on film, because I want all that as well. Um, and the old people and the little kids and yeah, you're on stage and doing your stuff and you think you're so hot and you're just given something to go for the first time. You know, like three M three pride marches and Melbourne's not gonna like this. Melbourne has the most boring pride march in the fucking world, and they walk down Saint Kilda and not allowed to have floats. No floats. If they want that, they can go to Sydney not because of the power lines, not because of the tram lines, just because the pride people say no floats. I so wanted to wear water wings with all my friends this t-shirt and said, I'll float if I fucking want to, um, down in the street. Um, but that's how it is. And I just went, I went, Why do you want to go to the right over the other side of town? It is boring. And I went, Oh, I know, I just This is what I do And I went there and I saw a 14 year old I think, 14 or 15 or might have been a little bit older, and I didn't think I thought he just had a different look. I know he was putting his toggle on I went, he smiled at me and I went, Hey, so what are you here for? Wasn't a contrived he went, Oh, I'm waiting for the rest of my troop to arrive because I'm gay. And there's another guy in my scout troop that are gay. And so, uh, all the other guys in my scout troop, um, said they'd come and walk with us in the parade, and it was his first ever pride march and his friends were supporting him. See, Pride is important for other reasons. And see that young man walked down the street with his friends and he couldn't have done that 10 years ago. The scouts would have it would have thrown a thing. And and so the circle is getting wider and wider and wider. And if we if we just encourage extensions and not always look at the person in the fabulous drag shoes, just think, Yeah, they Yeah, fantastic. They're gonna be there on Friday and Saturday at 1 p. m. two PM and 3 p. m. But, um, I just think not not not going up to that thing going good on you and stuff like that. But I photographed that boy with his mates because that that particular pride and I got all the fancies drag queens and the leather man on the bellies on the ground and et cetera, et cetera. But I went home and I saw that photograph I don't want Yeah, you can. I don't think ever underestimate the power and and just the sheer intensity of those first You know, that that first pride event or the or the first time you were in with a whole lot of other queer people? What? When did when did you get that feeling? Um, OK, when I first lived in San Francisco, I didn't. I went to the Castro only once because that wasn't my No, I wasn't any, but I didn't even know what it was. But I went. I only went there because they had a gospel gospel music. So at the theatre. So no, it wasn't that, um my sense of solidarity really came in the form of no September 81 Falls Park, Mount Albert and we had the squad and we had all those different people marching on the same flag and something just one pro problems and I looked behind a flat a tree and I got a photograph. And Bruce Burnett and his flatmate, Kevin and Bruce Burnett from the AIDS Foundation basically founded that I got such a buzz last for you. And I went, Yeah, dude, that's such a thrill Because, yeah, he was with gays for freedom, marching in another a whole lot of other people that were fighting for human rights and taking their place in that and being part of human human rights. And so I think that that's that. Did it for me. But then again, seeing the floats come together for hero 91 94 the first hero and seeing the streets claimed and applauded Victor Motu wasn't in that parade, But I saw I saw Victor go up the street on a truck, getting him the pause, getting the the you know what I mean? Like so, Hero hero 91. I mean, I been been at the previous first hero party, was just held in the, um thing, and that was great. I walked around, um, the railway station for the hero parade and substances and substances is an operative word of that particular generation. You know, we're all sort of flying guys. But I just went around and told anyone that I liked that I always I forgot to tell people, you know, you might have sleep with somebody and they become disposable or you and you saw them again and they they still here. But he was so wonderful. I don't care what substance people were on, but people went around and it was like they were all letting other people know I value you having. They weren't saying those words, it was just an action. And, you know, there was, You know, we didn't have a drag show. 1234. We had 25 of them on the stage and and, you know, those anthems were about We are family, et cetera. So we had the we had the soundtracks as well to hear all that life, um, going then in San Francisco, 1993 and seeing Sorry, it takes me back, See people being more withered away. People are about to die being wheeled down the street. One guy and somewhere I got a photograph, and it's all but in a wheelbarrow that someone that has friends pushing, and he's got my memory of it is probably totally distorted from the photograph and seeing something totally different. And so and And, um that's where that diversity thing came because there were two spirit people who are what we call trans people. And there were all these people who had a place in that parade that were honoured. And I saw for the first time disability people having a place did people go up and hug them after them? No, not really. But get used to us. We're here, you know, We're all busy going around. We we we're here, We're not going shopping and all that shit, and there's another layer behind us A and and so those diverse things, like the 5. 5 hours of going. And I and I saw what people I saw what people were meaning, especially with the the eventu of Mardi Gras and hero, because I hear lots of shit going down now are splitting up into our different colours of the flags and becoming fighting with each other over which is the thing. I mean, I was in Sydney last the other year when they had the first stadium, but it's never gonna be the same. We own the street. Why can't we go to the fucking stadium? Why can't we claim the biggest place in? And I went to the protest march during the day and there was a place for everybody. Let's have both. Why do we have We've got to stop thinking singular, because it was that put us in the cell thinking. I think I'm sorry. I've gotten more psychological, but, um so seeing diversity amongst our ranks, which is what we wanted to bring to be acknowledged for, um, so fucking wonderful. Um, so, yeah, um, the commercialization of parades. Because that's something I have seen. And, yes, I have got lots of friends that are 79 in Sydney, and I honour what they've done. Well, that was their experience. And that has a page in our book. There are other pages, and some of that is being in San Francisco and seeing 5000 people in the brightest of colours dancing down the street with Facebook t-shirt, facebook T shirts on, and, uh, funny little man that tells us we can't write dyke in Facebook and we can't write different words because it's a derogatory term. The only you know, the main man from, uh, Facebook on a trolley car with all his employees around. And Facebook later goes, not allowing trans people to use their own names. It's been corrected. Thanks, Sister. Roma. Roma from San Francisco. Um, look that person up, um, and I just went What the fuck? Why are all these commercial? Because you're exhausting me. 5000 people in one contingent is too much. When it's a 5. 5 hour parade and one employ, all the people are gone. Skip the leather man and the whacking people people at the end. No, I wanna see that now. Um, but you know, we need we need family friendly because they're getting educated. But I also now realise that it's not just those commercial businesses. Yes, that's their intention. Yes, they want to get their word across. My hope is that anyone working in any commercially driven float where it's the warehouse, the warehouse, that everyone gets a bargain, Hopefully that works that those people in having their name and their employees who are gay and friends, um means that they've got a kind of unwritten contract at work. We march and we take you to our parade. You take you You know what I mean? II, I hope I hope. I hope that's big one of the area that I just I'm really enjoying being It's gonna sell like, Oh, he's selling his saint her again in, uh, Melbourne. We have a woman called Yvonne Gardner. I photographed her on my 3rd 2nd night. I think in Melbourne I thought she was a drag queen old drag queen. She was doing all the moves and attracting a lot of attention to herself. And I found out she was a woman. This woman and I've got to tell her story. Can't be interviewed on anything without talking about people within our fucking community. They are amazing. This woman 25 years ago or 25 years before she died, had gay friends. And please look up on YouTube when you get home. Look up, Yvonne Gardner. We were there. You will have to listen to her story and her smoky voice. And she will tell you what it was like as a woman going into our not an America story into somewhere as close as Melbourne into the AIDS wards. And she will she does. She takes you. When she tells you the story, she takes you there. She revisits stories, and I guess I tend to do that as well. She she revisits and she tells you exactly, You can see in her eyes when she's not knowing the person that's so with it and not knowing their name and looking up and going, Oh, such and such. You look wonderful and empowering these dead people. And anyway, from that, she they start putting people who aren't dying. This is my understanding into public housing and all around a certain area of So it could be Freemans Bay if you like the version of that in in Auckland. But it wasn't and they put people who were not because the the the AIDS were full. People went to see five people was bigger there than what quite we had in proportion. People knew more people that were dying, and because those AIDS wars were so packed of people dying, there wasn't enough room there. This is my understanding for the people who are not yet there, not hospice ready. And they placed them in these little government departments and they lived there in isolation. And Yvonne Gardner, this woman let's not ever become misogynist, this woman, but crook soak and she'd go round and fill up their pot and then the house. And then what she noticed was that they're dying. They're dying of stigma. They're dying of loneliness. And whether this was the way she linked it or not, She just went around and said next week, my car isn't using too much petrol. You boys all have to come down to this address. And she introduced those people who were dying and took them like carbon singularly burning in a fire and put them together. She created a community. Yeah, she sort of moves me. Yeah. So she, um, for 25 years, that woman up to her death a couple of years ago, organise raise funds from for funds for Britain, brought the food, cooked the food cleaned up from the food for 25 years, every Friday, Did that wove a community. And she raises money so that every year positive attitude is a group that is known. They have a Christmas lunch, and for 25 years, you know, for how many people turn up, I can't think of anything better to do than being with him and but not trying to fucking be noble or humble or playing your part. But a lot of people were at a funeral going What a fantastic woman she was, You know, a wonderful legacy. And for me, I just went because I've seen all that shit. I've seen the people in the wheelbarrow in San Francisco in 93 that didn't have Avatar. Uh, and I also heard that when I Gardner was fundraising for our community, she was asked not to enter into one of the game gay men's only venues collecting money for us. And, uh, you know, I heard that thing about my wife again. And, um so, yeah, one of my I love when I can get down there on a Friday, I work a busy life, but definitely Christmas Day I want to be there, and I don't stick my camera in their face to try and get the let's get the goalies before they go, because that's not my attitude. But if I can acknowledge that person's life, yeah, that's worthwhile. And and we've got all these people that have gone before us that we that that have set these wonderful legacies that do us so much good. And I just I just think don't just look at them on their photographs and call them fabulous. Um, I can do something. Just do what you can. Yeah. So I really like, um, what you were describing with, um, Yvonne in terms of, um, weaving a community. And I wonder, is that what you feel or some of what you feel when you're taking your photographs? Are you weaving a community in the individuals? Sometimes. Yeah. Sometimes my camera gets me out of the house sometimes I I live solo and I, you know, it's a life I like. And especially in Melbourne, I'm comfortably numb. I'm isolated. Covid hasn't helped that it's not a sad story, just how it is and something will come up and I'll go. No one wants to go there, and I you know, and it's like my camera sits there and goes, I'll go out with you, OK? And we'll go out and just going out. I mean, sometimes it won't necessarily. I might start with the intention of going to somewhere that's gay or politically aligned and that will open up to Oh, I saw all these people that I wasn't interested. You know, I didn't think I'd be, you know, get outside the door and and see what life opens up. So, um, no, I don't. Is one of the reasons that I haven't passed my photographs on to, um, magazines stuff. All that kind of stuff is, um, yeah, I haven't I haven't really. It's only recently. I mean, II, I what I have as precious cargo. It definitely is. I do. I attach my name to that. Oh, fuck. Two years ago is about, I think the first time I ever actually, uh, watermark photos, Um, and because I've seen quite a few of my photographs Carmen repay, for instance, pop up and just Google search. Hm. That's great, isn't it? And I'm wrong. I actually no, um I think I'd like to put my name on that. Not as a an art thing, but there are. There are pictures of Carmen who's now right up to my right up to a couple of months who think that I just had a wealth of experience from that person and some of the photos I've gone. Oh, they haven't got this in, but I can look at those pictures and go That should go to Papa. Not that I took that photograph just because that's a real you know, it's not coming and full on with cleavage and stuff like that. It's that great big flower and that high hairstyle and and the Maori nose and the Maori chin and it just peering out from the side and and so I can see beyond my difference. Sometimes I can just see that is a beautiful if it captures the essence of somebody. So, yeah, I think I think there's a lot amongst all that archive because a lot of us really busy and too much. You know, I put 10 pictures up a day on on my Queer World site, and sometimes I I bury the individual essence. It is for me by multi shooting it, I don't know. The right word for that is there's too much, you know, I've got I've got too many photographs. You know, I, I don't go and go. Oh, yes, you know I'm But I tried to estimate, especially after I went digital. I must have over a million photographs and they sit on my computer and they'll go, Why aren't you da da da da? I was like, Oh, it's not because I'm being selfish with them. They're there for anyone who wants them. And I'm gonna give you a different answer to your question. In about 1985 I had friends who had brought an Ashram for no particular reason, and one was an American, and they thought if they moved up there, they could have lots of friends, and that usually happen. Except on Fourth of July, they'd have Fourth of July. I think they didn't buy everybody up and we get there and we stay the whole week and there will be this group of we you know, we liked our herbals in those days, and we did lots of herbals and and and just got to know people, and I would generally feel really different. I keep very keep to myself as, um, sometimes I couldn't be bothered with people, and sometimes I didn't feel like I could. I had a placement with him, but on the last day, and this happened several times. But this thing of archiving that we will only be like this once would drive me, and I didn't have a contrived idea, but hopefully I'll get a picture of all of them together. But that was too big for me to take on, uh, at 12 people looking back at me. No. And I didn't want to put people in the spotlight, so I would ask him if they would come out individually. One. But just at different times when I felt and I went up to this guy and he had a puppy dog and I can I photograph you and me and yeah, that that's all right. I went, But not here. We don't have to be. And he went, Oh, OK. Then we'll take the dog for a walk around. Yeah, let's set the dog. I took him out and I took some photos and I lovely photographs of this young Maori man And my friends who hosted that were down in Auckland once and they were looking through my photograph and they went, Oh, that was such a great weekend. And then we went through. And then about a year later, I believe it was they contacted me and I went, Do you still have photographs of da da da. And I went Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, um, do you still have the one of we mocker? And I went Are you more the guy with the dog? Oh, yeah. Look, they're in the photograph album. They might might be a bit, you know, shabby by now, but yeah, And I went because we recently showed pictures that you took the pictures there, um, to them. And they're wondering is there any possibility that they could buy copies of you? All right. Yeah. You have to buy a copy of something. You want a picture of your kid and you if you know you. God, I I'm just you know what I mean. I just took photos and they told me that had gone live somewhere else for some years before, and he came back home, was the secret, and he died of the virus, and they didn't get to see him in full bloom because he lived out in gay world. He just came home to die. And they recognise in this photograph the sun that they brought up the sun that they were proud of and they wanted to know if they could use those photographs for his headstone, that will mean always more to me than having a fucking exhibition. Yeah, because, you know, like, that's the archive that that leads me back to your Facebook group. And where, where, where? You're showcasing the images. And, um, I've just got a little bit of text from the about page. It says, um, so it was set up 10 years ago in September 2012, but this group will be participants, not merely observers. And I guess I'm really interested in, um in your thoughts around that that that actually you don't want people just to look at images as you you You want them to kind of connect and communicate to you? Yeah, it's that's that's a really interesting one because it plays the social media. It brings up a whole of stuff, right? I would have stopped within a week if I was dependent on getting my likes and my comments. It also keeps me off the streets that doesn't You know what I mean. Like it, it gives me a little mission to do with the stuff. I don't have to see people connected with it. I understand. And it's just the way we are that a lot of people are never going to comment on this. There's a photograph of them, Um, and I don't I don't I don't need that. When I said Participant, Of course, Then I became people start putting their pictures and I'm like, Oh, I think I used the wrong words. They're all about me. Yeah, actually, this is just my window. And when I said participants, I wasn't asking you to. Sometimes I feel it. It's like this when there's nothing at all there for ages. It's a little bit like cooking dinner, and it's my choice to put 10 photos a day that I pluck out and put them up there. And it, you know, it's a it occupies me. It's doing me more therapy than it's doing anyone else. And I get to relive those moments to be reminded of all those values and the heaviest ones and all that you know. But imagine that you are, and this is the world of social media. Now it's the it's we live in the the age of the selfie and the etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. We would take lots of them and keep taking them. Keep taking them. Record your history. It's really important. Um, but imagine cooking dinner for people every night. Did you want them to say it's a lovely so like that? I like Fuck off. That means nothing. Conversation. Would you cook meals continuously for people to come round if you didn't have any discussion with any any current conversations. So I love it when somebody goes. He was a really amazing man. I don't want to hear that. Because a lot of pictures if you look at them, they technically their shit composition is really interesting. But look at what I got to work with. You know, that's strong in the photograph, but yeah, When When If somebody in there if one of those photos resounds, Uh, I wish you had that. Facebook had a button that said hit something for me. Not like not compli not compliment icons, but just recorded a response that not thank you, Kim, for taking me there. But that person separate one of you come straight in your photographs. That person empowered me, gave me something, gave me something really made me cry was the best blow job I've ever had. Just just just acknowledge that person not to be measured or recorded by me. And so that's that's the participation. And again it's I guess it's a little bit linked to Maori is in the sense that we don't have to sit there and spend hours and hours and hours honouring our ancestors before we talk to each other. But it means that we it's a vehicle to us thinking outside ourselves. Yeah and I. I learned that well, that's my version of what I learned from being amongst Maori people as I know the stories, you don't have to know them all. But just there's a world just outside us that's, you know, I come back so sidetracked when I come back to Auckland as much as I can, and I ask whoever I'm staying with, what do you want to go? Bring a Bring a Tira Oh, sorry to, and I get driven out on the and just like they laugh because they drive past it every day. It's nothing, and I get to come home and go across the water and see something that's bigger than me gonna be here long before I was here long after I was there. And so I'm fortunate. I'm really fortunate that I got given that set of eyes the gabbling mouth that you know, used to stammer but talks like crazy. Too many words an hour that can turn an hour and a half interview into a fucking series. But, um, you know, I'm so fortunate and we all we all are. You know, in the last 15 months, I've had seven significant people, not just friends, not just Oh, let me put my quota of dead people up. All of a sudden you go and they're 10 years. They're all 10 years young, at least 10 years younger than me. And I don't go. I outlasted them. I go, I've got no I've got no reason to feel stink about life. I've got no reason to stink. Feel stink about people who don't accept my lifestyle or bla bla bla like we We become so caught up in all that shit, you know? So you know, II, I find the archive for me life giving, life giving and and And that's really weird when you say, But there's so many dead people, they're angels. They continue to shine. They angels are not because I believe in a cause. I. I not sure I don't want to claim it, but I see other people that I know using When they put a picture up of somebody and they go, they right behind it once, now an angel. Now, I didn't come up with that one, but I think I wrote it really early in the piece. And And it's not because you're an angel because my religious things is because they continue to shine a light on my path and our path. You know, I I'm gonna go up later tonight. They're gonna walk up to S and M Bar. I'm gonna please see a picture of my cousin Da de Paul now an angel painted by vet now an angel Yvette, married man, father of two fantastic Children who I know today. It was had Children in the but had a great trade career and the best best you could see in in in in New Zealand Diversus. But it's just up the road here in Cuba. More think in your little city of Wellington, which I love that you have got someone running your gay bar that is bigger than the profit that they often don't make. And the losses that have got such a feeling here, Look at Look at if it's still there and I'm sure it will be Look at that wall behind the bar paving stones on the street. We don't sell them. Yeah, so, II, I can't see that and not go. Oh, yes, I've got one of those, too. I mean, thousands of what the fuck is that? And just it's wonderful that we can We're so privileged that we can I'm so lucky that so many of those people let me photograph them. Sometimes some of them tried to direct me, and these days I took me a while to deal with the, you know, people who Oh, we'll take another one and then do it like this. And they see them in their movie. They look like that. That's not how I saw. I mean, I learned to just smile and say, Yeah, I take photos, I don't take directions. And I'm not being arrogant with it. It's just like, Why don't I run out of film? And of course, I haven't run out of film because it's digital. But sometimes you just got to release yourself from all that. You know, I remember seeing a, um, a fabulous Brian brake exhibition at the Papa a few years ago, and he was photographing, um, Pablo Picasso and they had a contact sheet. They had a blow up of a contact sheet, and this was Pablo Picasso. And, um, Brian would have spent one or two frames. Not one frame was the same. And And I thought, Wow, you You have got such confidence that you've captured and then you've just moved on. Uh, do you do you find do you find that, or do you take multiple? Do you just keep? Yeah, I try, because again, I can't lapse into all that was technically right. I mean, if the person was drag is miming a song, and all of a sudden she had a note that just made her face look dreadful, I might secretly keep that photograph, but I'll get a good one. Um, um, no, I don't, I guess because II I grew up with not, you know, not having kind of money and shirt, that when I had a 36 film and that was that was breaking out to get a 36 film for a weekend, especially paying for the that even though I had no photographic skill and I didn't know about the balance of light or focusing or it was, it was point and shoot. I think that having that old school format has meant that I tend to land the photo that I want pretty quickly, you know that. How do I have no fucking idea how I did that? No idea so many. There are so many incredible flukes, but I guess that, you know, it's like the the person with the most incredibly disabled legs providing their up and about on those legs. They move faster than what they realise and and I I can that that's maybe the case for me. I I'm I'm I still see them as well. Flute. Um, but yeah, I, I It's not. It's not a I don't just sit. I don't sit there trying to get the photograph because, you know, I just want to get them and what they brought to it. And there's another five down there. Besides, you know, get round. I'm really interested to know how you actually hold the camera? Because some of the photos I've seen they look like it's it's from the hip, some from the you know, the face. How how How do you use the camera? Uh um, my body is my tripod. So when I tried to take myself seriously by doing wedding photographs to make extra money so I could travel and I it was total terror because I didn't know what I was doing. Um, I got a tripod because that you know that that that'll that'll make your life, you'll be a proper photographer and all it was was something else to lose or ask Where have I put that or break or fall over or in anything? And so I guess I've become my own kind of tripod. Um, it'll be often you. I always want other people to get their photographs, and so I tend to try and keep a low profile. I hate this thing, and I know a few photographers on the scene who are like, Oh, sorry, but they will stand up to be seen in front of the taking. The photographs I find you're gonna get that contrived is gonna actually, every ingredient flavours a soup, both the taking of the photograph and the person being photographed. I tend to be sneaky, and sometimes sometimes they're a bit torturous. I don't see that that they're being torturous And because that's, you know, no one wants to be photographed from here and here and here. But the the option is that I stand up and take on a profile, and it's like, Yeah, no, I don't I. I don't know how I take photographs. Somehow they just turn out how they turn out. You have talked earlier about, um, maybe having a bit of banter and also posing people. So So some of the stuff that you're doing is not like captured in the moment. You you were saying that you actually do direct? Yeah. Yeah, if I if I mean I'm not. Also, I'll try and get candid because that's the essence of that thing that I experienced. It looked like that. Um, I will let's say I've got five drag queens and they're all competing. They don't realise it, but they're all in that moment all competing for the limelight. And they think in their movie they look great. in the movie I'm seeing actually be. It's not tallest to shortest, but it's like this is going to be the most. And the times that I do direct compose the shot. Um, they are I have some confidence in the composition that I will put people in the shot, and I will not let anyone cloud anybody out. So I'll bring that person down, and now that person will be at the back and I'll go now come forward and I'll Sorry, I. I know what I do. I get so much exercise whenever, whenever I'm out at a Ben when I'm doing that because I don't explain the shots, I'm gonna jump away from the microphone to say and this isn't gonna transfer, But I'll say, Gareth, this and not this This this this is and I will construct this because I've taken in without realising it. Everyone's height, dah dah dah broken teeth, dislocated whatever and tried to blend into something so so very much kind of, um, physically demonstrating to people that kind of Yeah. I mean, um, jumping, I'm I can't say so. I'm, uh because I find that if I say if you say something in words to someone like Stand up Gareth and and and turn to the left. You will do what I imagine, Um, also and I've learned this through the people I work with in disability. Most disabled people have photographed their disability. First people photographed them like this because they're not sure I tend to get in here. Who? I You're pissing me off at the back because if I say them smile, do you know what they do? They do, and we still do this. We don't realise we do. We do what we think are smiler A they, they they pull all these expressions and they close their eyes. And and so I have a Down Syndrome woman that I work with, and I've learned her language, not my language. Learn other people's language. That's the best way to get the best out of them. And I'll say to her, Look at my hat now you're not looking at my hat. You can't see my hat with your eyes and I haven't even got a hat on. And she will be up here and I get the essence of her because the way she's scrunching because we do these things that we how we expect to be recorded and it's not our essence. And it may make for a glamorous shot, but generally it will deplete. Yeah, the best. The best is real. I think maybe with a few more feathers. Is there anyone that you had wished? Or is there anyone or an event you had wished you had photographed? Yep. Um, because that opens a big door. Um, yeah. Keith Haring at work. Um, I love his simplicity and his his life and stuff like that. Heavy milk, Nelson Mandela, All the people that tried to make a difference. Yeah, I. I haven't got enough photos of Yvonne Gardner and I've got heap of there heaps and heaps of her. Um, and I'll never have enough because Yeah, I do. I, I there are just Yeah, there are. There are people. There are why I didn't get that. You can't go back and change that. I'm sure I got my plastic camera after he was around. Oh, my God. And I remember going once with Maori friends to the Maori Community Centre and where Victoria Park is and I went there with some young people to a dance there. And Victor Moto and his friend Caprice. This has just come out now. Victor Moto and his Caprice were over there, and they were dancing, and no one was mocking them. I didn't realise we had. Yeah, you've been so generous with your time today. I mean, it's been an amazing time we've had, and I'm just thinking in terms of, um, kind of looking at maybe, um, coming to the end of of our chat. And you've really kind of highlighted to me that the images you take are about capturing the essence of people. And you've you've mentioned a number of people. Um, I'm thinking of people like Carmen. Could you, um, tell me what? What do you think her essence was? I don't think even she realised what it was because she had a business card. She used to walk around in the street and I'd come down and see da I've got to tell the story. It's so cool. And you'd see Dana. I mean, I met Carmen years ago in 70 then I, Donna and Donna and Georgia were working at the Purple Onion in the late seventies, and Dana would come out. She's got her breast implants. She was coming to call down on Vivian Street. So she brought her single fabric dress underneath her breast. Nothing to do with the traffic that was going by and street at all my music salacious. And here, coming down the street, bring quite something quite simple and summary for Carmen. You know, the hair right up the flower and the hair. And Carmen came down and he went, Oh, hello, girls. And she'd been giving out cards to people in the cars. Who she was doing business with us. But she had this car that a white business card. And I said it was Carmen International entertainer, right? And she came down. This so, so rich. This is this is Wellington. Wonderful, wonderful, rich culture. She Hello, girl. Oh, I know you people. How are you living in Australia? Oh, I know you're living in Auckland. That's right. And she would have a little chit chat with us during calm and chit chat. And then she left for you. Want your and you want your shoes? Oh, yes, girl. Donna went into the back of the purple onion and came back carrying a pair of shoes, and Carmen leaned on my shoulder as she would later on when we pulled her pull ups in the hospice and said, Thanks, girl and put these shoes on and Donna went back into the club with the shoes and come in anyway, I must go. She was on her and I said to Donna, What was that all about? Because I asked, When I see things I don't just photograph, I want to know what it was all about. And Donna told me, Oh, calm on her big feet. They swish. She can't just walk around the streets of her dumb to throw her in it as well. She know her circuit is seven clubs and she has a pair of shoes. She changes her shoes at that club and they take the shoes and they put them in the fridge for her so that the next time she does the circuit she got a nice pair of cool shoes. But she hasn't worked too far, and I went there's that fucking the trick. They used to call it trick in in drag world that that was a trick and and Donna went to two. Fucking trick. And I went. What do you mean she went Well, those shoes never get seen. Seen in the same place for one week. And she had this little She developed this little thing right through to in hospice, and I went and saw her. This is so beautiful. I knew she was there. Someone had told me she'll probably appreciate some deep fried oysters. She likes her deep fried oysters. You know, we're not there. And Cameron was fading, and she still put the big red lips on. And she rearranged a few strands of hair and she fluttered her eyebrows. Hello, girl. How are you not coming? She went. Now you're Donna's family, aren't you? And I went, Yeah, I brought some. Yeah. Yeah. How's your people? I I've gone to see these people that we wave up and down. She's on a float when she comes home that we have these big and she's dying. And she's lonely in the hospital. And not because I was there. I could get no credit for that. And she was asking me how I was. Um, there was a weird accident that happened in her in her, um bathroom in her room, and she told the nurse, Don't worry about that about come back later. She wasn't being demanding. Carmen never demanded. She commanded attention. She never demanded that. Oh, that we would learn. That was her essence. Her rule was pure. Anyway. The the nurse said, I'll come in, I'll give you a hand with your didn't say the word because they pull me up, come and turned around and went Don't worry about that, darling, she said. I'm with I'm with family I. I never I don't know if she remembered my name for all the times we had seen her and she anyway there. And she bent over in front of me and I went to pull her pull ups up, getting really humbled, and she turned around and she went, Oh, you do realise I never had the whole change, didn't you? And I went No, I didn't know anything about that car. And she went just in case. There's some surprises, and I just There's no words for that. No, she was just She was just so Sitcom was very in. My experience was very, very simple, and it kept her purity. One last story of Carmen because that's where I want to leave. This interview is, Are you a local person? I went after photograph. They had a A show in, Put Together a show in Auckland called Carmen's Coffee Lounge, which I photographed over two nights and like, Oh, where are you now? And I mean, I'm gonna be over in Sydney soon. She went. I'll come and visit me and I went OK, this is before she got the motorised thing and she was living in Riley Street. We're in Ham and I went, I didn't know where she lived. That's why I didn't have her address and I went to Williams Street. I think it is where the transsexuals and the trannies, et cetera, et cetera, do their business. And I'm I know we had a phone came, but she's there. Had to wait till about half past 12 at night. I won't give you ages, but do the math. We're talking 1994 She's no spring chicken, and there she is. In the you know, the cleavage is almost down to the waist. The hair is as high as the opera house that she's floating organza, saying still with cars and car and international entertainers. Still the same cars as she had. Yeah, all those years before. Yeah, And she saw me. Oh, hello, darling. And the big Red. Looks like I said, Which road papers do your lips car? Oh, you're funny, aren't you? But she's good. And then she said, Come with me, darling. And we walked down and I was her balancing stick. We walked down that from the, uh, Coca Cola sign. We were walking down the entrance. So she's doing her nods at the cars and stuff like that. And then we got down there and there were She went, Oh, we gotta cross the road, hold me up. And she made me cross the road and I went I'm not being your fucking fucking hooker's fucking aid, you know? No, no, no. She saw a trans person on the wrong end of drugs and she went over and she went She made her way Be She went. Girl, are you alright? No fierceness girl, Are you all right? Show me. You can sit up. You're gonna be all right. And the person went Yeah, Yeah, I'm all right. Carmen and Carmen reached into her bag and she said, Make sure you got these and she put her hand into her bags and picked up put, put out some condoms and some lube and pop them into that thing. And we did that twice in about five minutes. What was Cameron like? So rude for that? I thank you, willing to keep honouring that the that she planted here can still grow if we let it. That's what I want to say. The full transcription of the recording ends. A list of keywords/tags describing the recording follow. These tags contain the correct spellings of names and places which may have been incorrectly spelt earlier in the document. The tags are seperated by a semi-colon: 1950s ; 1960s ; 1970s ; 1980s ; 1990s ; 2000s ; ANZAC Day ; Anti Springbok tour protest (1981) ; Aotearoa New Zealand ; As You Are (Auckland) ; Auckland ; Auckland Hospital ; Aura Hotel ; Australia ; Backstage ; Brian Brake ; Bruce Burnett ; COVID-19 (coronavirus) ; Carmen Rupe ; Castro District ; Chinese ; Christianity ; Christmas ; Community Centre ; Cuba ; Dana DePaul ; David ; Drag Queen ; Europe ; Events ; Ferry building ; Fiji ; Gay Liberation Front ; Georgina Beyer ; God ; Greg ; HIV / AIDS ; HIV stigma ; Harvey Milk ; Hero (Auckland) ; Hero dance party ; Iran ; Job ; Keith Haring ; Korea ; Kym Strathdee ; Malcolm Kennedy-Vaughan ; Mark Zuckerberg ; Melbourne ; Midsumma Festival (Melbourne) ; Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa ; Māori ; Māori Community Centre ; Mātauranga Māori ; Nelson ; Nelson Mandela ; Pacific ; Panmure ; Patrick Crowe ; Pentecostalism ; People ; Porirua Mental Hospital ; Positive Attitude Inc (Melbourne) ; Pride parade ; Princes Wharf (Auckland) ; Queen Street (Auckland) ; Rangitoto Island ; Samantha James ; San Francisco ; Scott Kennedy ; Scotty and Mal's Cocktail Bar ; Shirley Bassey ; Sister Roma ; So Far from Kansas ; Stuff ; Sydney ; Sydney Mardi Gras ; Talk of the Town ; The Purple Onion ; The Taproom ; Tiny Tina ; University of Auckland ; Victor Motu ; Wellington ; Wellington Regional Hospital ; Wimoka Smith ; Yvonne Gardner ; acceptance ; accessibility ; accident ; activism ; ancestors ; archives ; artist ; attitude ; balance ; bars ; beats ; bisexual ; board ; bottom ; breast augmentation ; breasts ; broken ; building ; business card ; button ; camera ; camp ; career ; cars ; change ; children ; choice ; church ; class ; clothing ; clubs ; coffee ; coffee bar ; colour ; commercialisation ; community ; composition ; condoms ; confidence ; congregation ; connect ; conversation ; cooking ; costumes ; courts ; culture ; dance ; dance party ; dancing ; death ; difference ; disability ; disability rights ; diversity ; division ; dog ; drag ; dress up ; drugs ; eating ; environment ; essence ; exercise ; exhibition ; face ; facebook. com ; failure ; family ; fashion ; ferry ; film ; filming ; fish ; flags ; flowers ; flying ; food ; foster homes ; freedom ; friends ; fun ; fundraising ; funeral ; gambling ; gay ; gender ; glamour ; gods ; government ; grandparents ; guilt ; hair ; hair style ; hat ; hate ; hell ; history ; hit ; holding hands ; honours ; hooker ; hope ; hospice ; hospital ; housing ; hug ; human rights ; icons ; individual ; integration ; isolation ; jewellery ; journey ; justice ; knowledge ; language ; leather ; legacy ; legs ; liberation ; lifestyle ; loneliness ; loss ; love ; magazines ; march ; marching girls ; marriage ; marriage equality ; media ; meetings ; mining ; mistakes ; movement ; music ; my hat ; news ; nightclub ; normal ; nurse ; observer ; opera ; organised ; other ; oysters ; pain ; parade ; parents ; parties ; passing ; performance ; pervert ; photography ; photography (film) ; plan ; pool ; power ; prayer ; prince ; privilege ; profile ; promiscuity ; protest ; queen ; queer ; race ; racism ; rainbow ; reclaim ; religion ; rent ; respect ; running ; scene ; school ; scouts ; selfie ; sex ; sex work ; shame ; shoes ; shooting ; shopping ; sin ; sinner ; smile ; so gay ; social ; social media ; solidarity ; stigma ; straight ; street photography ; struggle ; suit ; support ; tangi ; taonga ; teeth ; the other side ; theatre ; ties ; time ; top ; tourism ; tram ; trans ; transexual ; transgender ; travel ; trick ; trickness ; trust ; truth ; two-spirit ; understanding ; underwear ; university ; values ; venues ; victim ; video ; voice ; volunteer ; wairua ; walking ; water ; weaving ; wedding ; whakapapa ; window ; work. The original recording can be heard at this website https://www.pridenz.com/kym_strathdee_profile.html. The master recording is also archived at the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington, New Zealand.  For more details visit their website https://tiaki.natlib.govt.nz/#details=ecatalogue.1093065. Please note that this document may contain errors or omissions - you should always refer back to the original recording to confirm content.