Then other elements of the dance were ushered in during the early 1990s, to form two new types of vogue dancing, called “new way” and “vogue fem.” This “old way” of pop, dip and spin vogue dates back to the 1970s and 1980s.
But when people who were double jointed, who were acrobatic, started putting that in their vogues, then they wanted to call it a new way of voguing, and call pop, dip and spin, old way.” “And it's in relationship to break dancing. “Really, vogue was called pop, dip and spin,” explains Roberson. Willi Ninja, another legendary member of the house ball community, has also been referred to as the “Godfather of Voguing.” Regardless of its creator, the art form had another name before it was called vogue. According to Roberson, some believe that Paris Dupree-a pioneer in the house ballroom scene-created vogue, while others believe that it was created by a Black gay or trans person in the New York City jail complex at Rikers Island. The dance style originated within the world of gay and trans Black people, but its exact origins remain unclear. Vogue is a type of improvisational dance inspired by the poses of models in fashion magazines. Categories range from face (the judging of a house members’ beauty) to body (the appreciation of a house members’ curves), to runway, to performances including vogue. Instead of the pageant-style of competition in drag balls, house balls held competitions between houses by categories.
And so, ballroom morphs from drag ball to a house ball,” Roberson says. “And you begin to see the shift again from mother-children to mother-father-children, so men begin to participate. This signified a shift from trans women and female-presenting people in house ballroom to the inclusion of gay men and male-presenting people in houses and house ballroom. House ballroom further differentiated from drag balls in 1973, when Erskine Christian became the first gay man to compete, according to Roberson. The house ball and the House of Labeija inspired many other prominent figures in the ballroom world to create houses of their own throughout the 1970s and beyond. Moving away from this reliance on one's biological family, and complicating ideas of a family of choice.”Ĭrystal and Lottie went on to host the first house ball in Harlem in the early 1970s, entitling it “Crystal & Lottie LaBeija presents the first annual House of LaBeija Ball.” The ball, designed exclusively for Black and Latinx trans, gay and queer people, was a success. “It provides the basic kind of kinship structure, and also demonstrates alternative possibilities for what kinship can look like. “In ballroom, houses offer the primary infrastructure upon which the scene is built,” explains Glover. These houses became more like families than teams, led by house “mothers” or house “fathers” to guide and groom their house “children” for the world.
Crystal agreed, and the House of LaBeija-the first ever ballroom “house”-was born, with Crystal at the helm as the “mother.” The Birth of House Ballroomįrom its inception, ballroom houses offered security for Black and Latinx queer, gay and trans people. In the early 1970s, Harlem drag queen Lottie LaBeija convinced Crystal to promote her own ball. LaBeija refused to participate in other drag pageants, but she didn’t exit the ballroom scene altogether.