The Cabaret

The Cabaret is a series of portraits and videos of LGBTQ communities and their allies around the world. Drag queens, go-go dancers, bar tenders, artists, DJs, nudists, athletes, and some of the regulars are part of a group of unsung heroes that cherish their freedom as artists and outsiders, celebrating their own individuality. All the participants in the project were met in a wide range of social spaces, bars, dance clubs, coffee places, athletic events, and Christmas parties, that reflect the vast culture and dynamics of safe havens that thrive on freedom and self-expression - survival tools to face the rise of fascism in several countries. The images that compose the series are created with the Kinect sensor, capturing 3D volume data, mapping RGB and IR information captured by the embedded digital cameras. The data is then visualized through custom programming code, written by the artist in Processing 3.0, and exported in real time as a sequence of uncompressed TGA files, that can be processed as individual images or turned into a still frame animation, using After Effects and Premiere. Photoshop is only used for compositing, color correction and resizing purposes.