Fetish nation

Let the wearer be aware, let the watcher be there.

by Alisa Gordaneer
Photographs by Angie Baan
4/19/00

Photos taken at the "Pin-Up Fetish Ball," produced by Midnight Carousel at Velvet Lounge (now Tonic), Pontiac. Look for "instance replay" again soon.

Backstage

In the photo, Mistress Pele dresses for the jungle scene. Cat ears. Leopard skin. Hair unbraided after the last sketch, a Wild West fantasy of roping, branding, studs. She takes on a new character, adjusts her pose. The smell of carryout Middle Eastern is in the air. Behind the players, a woman who looks like someone’s mother repairs the costumes, keeps the seams together.

The cast is naked with each other, then dressed enough not to be naked, not enough to seem dressed. No strip show this – it’s about what you’re wearing as much as what you’re not wearing: Fetish here implies saucy ‘40s gear, swing dancing, fishnet stockings. Reveal, but don’t bare all.

From behind the dressing room door, cracked open just enough to let light sneak a peek, comes a voice. "Close the door! I’m butt-ass naked!"

A muffled reply, and the same voice again: "Well, I don’t want anyone seeing me!"

Onstage

There is no picture, because you need to picture this in your mind. Because it’s all about imagining, all about fantasizing: Power dynamics, relationships, who’s on top and who’s been a very naughty girl ... onstage, at least.

The evening’s drinking and dancing is punctuated by gathering crowds, a short sketch – cowboy ropes blonde-braided cowgirl, brands her butt with a flaming iron – and a smattering of applause. Turn-on factor: Depends on your own personal level of voyeurism, own suspension of disbelief. It’s a big comedown to learn later that the branding iron is foam rubber, the mark nothing more than wet paint.

Power dynamics are sexy when you’re living them. Remember that crush on a teacher, that forbidden-but-therefore-more-desired romance? All those cop fantasies, that thing for handcuffs? Keep them in mind.

Because to watch someone else’s fantasy is not to be engaged by it, not to be swept up in its taboo. Unless your fantasy is voyeurism, but if that’s the case, the taboo is broken here, too. You’re invited to watch. Encouraged. And every half hour, a new scene is presented for your delectation. Watch. Applaud. Draw your own conclusions and go get another drink.

Offstage

In the picture, members of the audience become the performance. Some play up the gender roles, some fly against them. A man dresses as a dominatrix. A man dresses as a lizard, head-to-toe in spandex. A skinny woman wears a tiny, black-and-white shorts set, Billie Holliday flowers in her hair. It’s all so South Pacific as she swings on the dance floor, her partner keeping step. Sweater girls watch, and so do a collection of voyeurs, dressed for the sports bar, for the mall. Unless they’re dancing, everyone seems as though they’re waiting for something to happen. The jungle sketch is on. The audience gathers, claps, disperses again.

Bring your own toys, suggests the poster, an invitation to come and play, to delight in the touch of feathers soft on skin, the bite of a cat-o’-nine-tails on a butt dulled only by tiny leather hotpants. Sometimes, the lashes reach past the hem, catch stockinged skin.

It’s kind of like the way the evening feels. Sometimes, a moment of realization snaps past the dulling effects of sanctioned voyeurism, and a real, heightened sense – that elusive thrill of sensation, that stunning surprise – snaps your eyes open, takes your breath away.

We’re all here. We all want something to happen. We, in our dulled senses, all want something sharp to feel.

Alisa Gordaneer is Metro Times features editor.