In Conversation: Elizabeth Waterman Part 2
It’s fun that we have movies like Hustler and that we have celebs like Cardi B and Amber Rose and that is all great because it creates awareness and celebration of strippers, but you have to remember to give credit where credit is due.
Elizabeth Waterman (c) Reflection in mirror, 2017.
A dancer does her makeup for the night at a nude club in Long Island City, Queens.
After years of photographing backstage and behind the scenes, portrait photographer Elizabeth Waterman has thousands of images accumulating for her Dark Angels project. I wanted to know, how has Dark Angels evolved from its conception?
“A couple years into the project I started photographing the strippers in their homes. I focused on that for 6 or 8 months and that was an eye-opener and really interesting,” Elizabeth tells me. “As a portrait photographer, I feel like when you are comfortable and you have a rapport, that's when you have moments where you get a great photo. As much as it’s about them feeling comfortable, it is also about getting me comfortable being there. Sometimes I am the uncomfortable one!"
Elizabeth’s shift to shooting their personal spaces allowed her to open up communication; sharing with them, talking with them, seeing their homes and even becoming friends with the girls.
“It is these moments where you get more interesting pictures. All of my photoshoots are about building relationships to get the picture. You don’t just take a picture of someone, at least that’s not how I take pictures,” she confesses.
Given the length and complexity of the project, it’s safe to assume there were surprises along the journey. For Elizabeth, the biggest shock was discovering the common creative threads that were so closely intertwined amongst those who crossed her path. “I really had no idea that so many strippers are different kinds of creatives,” she exclaims and continues. “There was a girl, Charlie is the Bronx, she was also an actress; Mona Marie, who danced for Snoop Dog’s videos; Danielle was a script writer. There was a dancer in Long Island City who was supporting herself while being in a pretty successful band. There was a wide range of creatives; burlesque dancers at Jumbo’s the infamous LA strip club, and many of the Miami girls were influencers producing creative content for themselves as a brand.” Elizabeth was pleasantly surprised by this as she is drawn to shooting artists and wound up photographing more of them without realizing it at first. “A lot of them really do enjoy their job. A lot of them are there because they like to party and they have fun; that is their lifestyle and they are into it. I didn't expect that and it is really cool,” she shares.
Spending so much time around sexual entertainers must be educational on a few different levels. I wanted to know, did she herself learn any seduction techniques to take home to her own bedroom (or wherever she likes to have sex)? “Yes. Fucking totally. Are you kidding me!?” We have a laugh and she continues, “One of the reasons I got into this project was because I wanted to get more in touch with my own sexuality. I am drawn to how expressed they are sexually. I wanted to be more like that.”
So what was the biggest takeaway? “One thing you learn is that you have to have fun. The girls have fun; they are providing entertainment. There is a dancer called Jalapeno and she would hold a beer bottle between her ass cheeks and have guys try to throw stuff in it. Other girls would do handstands and land with their crotches onto people's faces. You realize, stop taking yourself so seriously and have fun with it! I laugh more now when having sex than I ever have. Laugh and have fun. It’s just sex,” says Elizabeth.
Elizabeth also really discovered the power of flirting and femininity. She tells me, “Your feminine power is like a fucking rocket and it’s your birthright. You’ve got it forever; it’s yours and you can use it or not and it can be fun to use. There is no harm in that.”
Some of you are experienced veterans when it comes to a night out at a strip club. For those of you who think you know, and those looking to discover the scene, Elizabeth breaks down strip club etiquette.
Rule No. 1: “Ultimately the main thing is to tip; you need to factor in bringing money to tip the girls. If you want to go and you don’t want to spend a lot of money, and you want to sit and watch the girls on stage, you still need to bring money to tip them on stage,” she says very seriously. “In your brain when you’re going to the strip club you need to add on at least $50-100 dollars in tip money as part of the cost of the experience,” she breaks it down bluntly. The takeaway? Bring that cash money. “It’s fine if you want to tip the girls on stage and be more modest, but you need to tip. If you want to do lap dances and you want to get into a VIP you need to tip more significantly and you need to think about it as part of going out for the night.”
Rule No. 2: “Respect the girls; everyone, be it a stripper or not, wants respect. They don’t want you to touch them when you are not supposed to. They want you to listen to the rules and enjoy yourself and have fun,” she says and then adds, “Ask permission when you are getting a lap dance, ‘can I touch your boobs, can I touch your butt?’ Every club has different rules, every state has different rules. They’ll fucking tell you.” Remember party people, you’re buying a service, you are buying sexual entertainment. They are there to serve. According to Elizabeth, “Ask for their opinion! It’s okay to ask, ‘what should I do, what do you recommend? Which dance tricks are you really good at?’” Bottom line, they are experts so treat them as such. Let them be the sexual entertainers that they are!
Elizabeth Waterman (c) In your face, 2017.
An experienced Bronx dancer gives a club goer the dance of a lifetime.
What is Elizabeth’s ultimate goal in creating the Dark Angels project? “I personally got such a kick out of when the girls saw the images of themselves from the week before. The girls were blown away by how beautiful and amazing they looked. It changed their perception of themselves. Any good portrait should do that; any good portrait should show that person in a beautiful way that leaves them with a different experience of who they are,” says Elizabeth.
“I’ve had dancers say, ‘wow you’ve really captured our world.’ If I can have dancers look at this book and feel more beautiful, more recognized and more elevated, that would thrill me. I feel like I’m indebted to the dancers more than anything else and I would want them to have that experience,” she says proudly.
If this work can contribute even a subtle shift in other people’s perceptions of strippers, Elizabeth will be pleased with her contribution to the shift in the cultural understanding of something. “There are movies that shift the way people see strippers. There are also articles and there is a shift happening to the perspective and I want to contribute to that,” she says. Her goal is to have people be accepting and respecting strippers, while dismantling negative stereotypes. The hope for Elizabeth is that her work will allow people to come to further appreciate strippers and put a higher value on female sexuality in general.
For Elizabeth, this work is centered around creating more value around feminine sexuality instead of deteriorating it. “This is a beautiful thing, this is an asset, this is monetizable, this is valuable; don’t fuck with it,” she says with confidence.
Elizabeth started out wanting to capture something special. She wanted to see this world of strippers and learn to be more sexually self-expressed. She tells me, “I wanted a new adventure. I was so curious and I wanted the thrill of being out late at night and I wanted to push myself. In another life I would be a stripper. I think that world is so cool and I saw some part of myself in it that I had to go explore.” We are so grateful that she did as the images are beautiful, thoughtful, fun and sexy. They are sexual without sexualizing, they are glossy while still being raw.
The work is targeted toward people who like art, and each image stands alone on its artistic merit. Anyone who wants to celebrate women’s sexuality and nightlife will be drawn in by this body of work.
In general, but also especially because of the Covid-19 pandemic, there is a lot of movement right now to get workers’ rights for strippers. “Historically strippers have been discriminated against by the clubs in terms of their employment status, and oftentimes there are celebrities that will capitalize on strip club culture but not really credit the strippers or kick back to the strippers,” Elizabeth recounts. “It’s fun that we have movies like Hustler and that we have celebs like Cardi B and Amber Rose and that is all great because it creates awareness and celebration of strippers, but you have to remember to give credit where credit is due.”
The fact is that actual strippers need some help in terms of getting status as employees rather than contractors. “There is stupid shit that goes down, like with Covid the federal loans for small businesses excluded sex workers. It excluded business that present live performances of a prurient sexual nature, like what the fuck is that!?” she exclaims.
“It is not okay for us as a culture to think strippers are cool and great and say we want to be like Cardi B and watch J Lo dance in the movies and listen to Lil Jon rap songs about ‘dancing like a stripper’, but the actual strippers need to be taken care of as well,” Elizabeth is as passionate about workers’ rights as she is about her art. “There are some organizations out there that are doing great work to change laws and provide support for strippers during the shut down.”
Check out and support organizations like Soldiers of Pole. It is run by two women Elizabeth knows personally and a trusted source for creating change and doing work on the ground.
Elizabeth Waterman (c) Laughing, 2018.
A dancer laughs in the VIP section of a Las Vegas gentlemen's club.
How are celebs stepping up? “FKA Twigs, a British pop artist was getting a lot of flack for using the stripper culture in her music videos and she responded well and put together a fundraiser on her Instagram to benefit British strippers and that is really great. It’s important to champion that kind of activity where influencers are helping the communities that they are capitalizing on. That should be celebrated and given more attention,” says Elizabeth.
In the post-Covid world, how have things changed in the industry? Elizabeth was just in Vegas and popped into Sapphire, one of the largest strip clubs in the world. They have been able to reopen by doing daytime pool parties. “They were offering cabana services and opening up to a limited degree,” she tells me. “Normally, on a busy night there could be 400 girls working there and there are definitely not 400 girls there now! Maybe 20 or 30 in the pool area. I talked to one girl who works as a stripper and does porn, so she has shifted strictly to porn for now.”
So how does the business side actually work? “In a majority of clubs these girls are contractors and their money is made when a client is there,” Elizabeth explains. “They are there to provide a service in exchange for money, however they often pay a fee to work at the club to cover management costs; they start the night in a deficit.”
If you are mediocre how do you fare? “You’re still going to be making more than minimum wage. If you want to make a career out of it and you’re good at sales and you are strategic, you can do quite well, you can do 6 figures absolutely,” says Elizabeth, “But that's not easy to do. You don't just walk in and make 6 figures.”
After all, this is a business and like all business, hard work and determination are key!
Have fun, play hard and remember, things will be opening up again soon and we want you to be prepared.
Elizabeth’s 6 favorite places to visit as soon as the doors open:
New York
Long Island City, right across the bridge from Manhattan, is one of the classiest clubs around (think chandeliers). It’s all-nude and open till 6 am. It’s going full-blast between 2 and 4 am, when the other clubs are winding down. No booze, but hey, if you want to stay up late enough, they’ll serve you breakfast (they have a full kitchen!).
Los Angeles
You simply must go! It features some of the city’s most accomplished burlesque dancers and contortionists.
On LaBrea, the steamy performances there are on the wild side; the girls even hang from the ceiling! You’ll also see quite a few two-dancer tag-team shows. There’s nothing else like it in LA.
Miami
The stunning, fully naked dancers will leave you more than a little breathless. Many are practically celebrities - some have millions of followers on Instagram. I’ve never seen so many $200 manicures in one place!
New Orleans
Located on Bourbon Street, this place is a kick with its refreshingly wide variety of dancers and performance styles. And yeah, a really, really tall pole. So you can throw dollars from the second story. Who doesn’t want to do that?
Las Vegas
The biggest club in the world. On some nights you’ll witness hundreds of dancers. And if you’re rolling in cash, get a Skybox and you can see the whole club scene from above, (with a sexy lady on your lap!). Nothing else compares.
LIMITED EDITION COLLABORATIVE POSTER
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Features photograph from Elizabeth Waterman Dark Angels project on strippers.
In Conversation: Elizabeth Waterman Part 1
Here is what makes a really good stripper. When you are sitting and watching a stripper on stage doing her show and you’re 20 or 50 feet away, and just from watching them you feel like you’re having sex with them.
Elizabeth Waterman (c) End of the night, 2017.
A dancer in the Bronx celebrates a successful night of lapdances.
I’ve known and worked with portrait photographer Elizabeth Waterman since our early days in New York. Over the past 10 years I’ve watched her develop as an artist, and posed twice for her various projects. We spent a Saturday afternoon a few weeks back getting caught up on her latest series and soon-to-be book. She was at her home in Santa Monica, I was at my townhouse in Montreal; the hot topic was all things Dark Angels. Her latest is a collection of photographs spanning the last 4 years and going behind the scenes and onto the stages of America’s most notable strip clubs. Elizabeth did not hold back about the joys and the stress of gaining access to and documenting this subculture, and let me in on the sexy takeaways that result from spending so much time in a sex-fueled environment.
Her goal with this project is to create something that peers inside a world people haven't seen before and she knew getting access to the strip clubs and photographing these girls was going to be difficult. “It’s not a common thing to do. I started to learn it’s a really political atmosphere,” she tells me. “You are not just dealing with strippers, you’re in an environment with the men and women paying to be there; you have the staff and the management, you have the hosts and DJ and the owner, the house mom and the girls,” she pauses, “there are so many people involved in this pseudo ecosystem.”
The biggest thing to overcome? Navigating the ecosystem in a graceful and respectful way, without being a pushover and making sure you get what you came for in terms of the body of work. From what she tells me, it’s a delicate balance like no other project she’s taken on before.
Elizabeth Waterman (c) Charlie in VIP, 2017.
Charlie gives a private dance in the VIP section of a Bronx party club.
“You really have to be cognizant of everybody; they all have different considerations, they all have different concerns. The owner doesn't want you interfering with any of the money being made. The clients usually don't want their photo being taken, the house moms want the girls to be happy, the girls want to make money, and you have to make sure you’re not stepping on any of those interests and everyone is happy that you are there,” she tells me in a very serious tone. “You have to make sure strippers are getting photos for their own use too. I would bring donuts and coffee to the management, because none of them owe you a thing. I would give them little video clips and special content for their social media platforms.”
Her biggest challenge? “In the clubs I had to find a way to make it cool and sexy that I was there, while being totally non-threatening,” she recounts, and again it’s clear that she took this very seriously. “I’ve never had a project before with such a complex environment. I definitely fucked up sometimes. Once I was at a club and the owner thought I was an exposé journalist; she had decided that I was there writing some kind of terrible thing about strippers and I was there to expose them or something. She kicked me out.”
After 4 years in and out of strip clubs I had to ask, what makes a good stripper?
“Here is what makes a really good stripper: when you are sitting and watching a stripper on stage doing her show and you’re 20 or 50 feet away, and just from watching them you feel like you’re having sex with them. Because of how they are moving and acting and how they are positioning their bodies you literally have this experience of having sex with them. It’s like you’re having sex with them visually and when that happens it’s amazing,” she sounds in awe, “It is an amazing performance; a really good stripper can really evoke something.”
We started talking about the tricks and let me say, these tricks are not for kids. “These pole girls doing tricks will do things that will take your breath away. In Miami there are 30 foot poles and these girls will drop 20 feet, like bam! There is a pole in Vegas that is 100 feet and I saw a girl drop 50 feet (drop meaning like she lets go of the pole and then grabs it with her thighs 2 or 3 seconds later). It makes your heart jump. The girls in Miami, they are solid muscles. Mona Marie, one of my favorite girls in the Bronx is a slim little woman, but solid muscle. They are doing splits on the ceiling; they hang off of the pole with an elbow,” she explains.
Elizabeth Waterman (c) Into the blue, 2017.
A dancer does pole tricks at an all nude club on Hollywood Blvd in Los Angeles.
We have a laugh at the thought of naked Cirque du Soleil, but I can tell by her tone that it’s not really a laughing matter, these girls are true athletes. “Imagine doing that, no clothes, no protection, just heels. It’s incredible. You see them in the locker room sometimes scarfing down food because they are working, burning crazy calories. They get bruises, it’s no joke, it’s a full contact sport.”
There is no need to go into the negative stereotypes that have been cast upon the world of stripping and strippers; it’s needless to say, we’ve all heard one or two less-than-savoury things. I wanted to know, what misconceptions did Elizabeth have before beginning this project that were debunked for her?
“I’ve always thought strippers were cool, amazing and fabulous; I’ve had friends that were strippers so I never had a stereotypical view of them. I had concerns that they would like me. I thought they would be annoyed that I was there and might not want to pose for a photo and I was really touched and moved with how generous and nice they were.”
Elizabeth Waterman (c) Dollars everywhere, 2019.
A dancer in downtown Los Angeles performs a table dance on a Saturday night.
When it comes to society's misconceptions she tells me, “there are a million of them and probably none of them are true, some of them are based on something but it’s like any group of people doing a job; there is no common norm. Look at any industry, any job, there are things about it.”
Oftentimes people are so caught up in the fantasy they can forget that being a stripper is a job, and as Elizabeth says, “people forget there is no one kind of standard stripper. I know there are stereotypes, but they often don't fit. These are complex people and the strip clubs are really different around the country. There are a lot of different crowds of dancers working there.”
As a female who has spent my fair share of time in strip clubs where the target audience was predominantly male, I had to ask how did being a female photographer in this scenario, taking photographs of women, influence the body of her work? “Most of them had not encountered a female photographer in a club before. I don't know how a man could have gotten into my shoes on this one. I was not there to sexualize them; I wasn't shooting for the club, I was shooting just for myself, my artistic vision, which is one of elevating these amazing women into goddesses and basically worshiping them.”
For Elizabeth that changed the tone of the relationship. She tells me, “Honestly, I probably spent 80% of the project in the locker room; as a man, they wouldn't have let you in. The locker room was where everything happened; it’s where I met them, talked to them and then I would shoot the club performance. It was 90% talk beforehand and sometimes I would talk to them for several weeks before they would say yes and I could shoot them on the club floor. If I hadn't had that access to the locker room, I wouldn't have had a project.”
I’m excited to announce a special limited edition collaboration poster with the artist:
