On a stage in Plaça de Catalunya, the central square of Barcelona, Spain, a replica of the iconic Tatik-Papik monument splits open. Through the “Grandmother-Grandfather” steps Bala, like a metaphorical birth, adorned in Armenian fabric with sharp shoulder pads, cutouts and silver jewelry. They hold a long sheer veil, attached to a traditional headdress, and with a stately stroll lip sync to the dramatic opening lyrics of “PreGomesh” by Armenian pop star Sirusho.
“For this performance, I was living my full Sirusho fantasy while paying tribute to one of my favorite monuments. Located in Stepanakert, the heart of Artsakh,” Bala later wrote on Instagram. “Sadly, just one year ago in 2023, Artsakh was occupied by Azerbaijan, forcing over 120,000 people to flee their homes, and now, they are trying to erase cultural symbols like this monument.”
In another performance meant to raise awareness of the Artsakh cause, Bala lip synced to folk ballad Sareri Hovin Mernem. “I was doing a ritual for myself, but at the same time for the people, to represent the grief and the power of being Armenian, which is coming since you’re born,” Bala told the Weekly.
Bala is one of many Armenian drag artists bringing unprecedented queer representation to international stages. With performances that celebrate Armenian heritage, music and history in ways that feel authentic to their gender identity and exploration, drag artists integrate queer and Armenian identities and reimagine what it can look like to be Armenian. While acute challenges, including prevailing gender stereotypes, shame and stigmatization of LGBTQ identities, and lack of visibility for queer and transgender Armenians, prevent wider acceptance, drag artists are building a vibrant subculture across the Republic of Armenia and its global Diaspora.
Bala was born in Armenia and moved to Spain as a child. Growing up, they could not tell their parents that they were queer. “When I arrived home, I would have to take all the earrings out,” Bala recalled. Longing to express themselves freely, they moved to Berlin, Germany six years ago and joined the local drag scene. “It was about being in a place where there was no fear that family members would see me…moving to another city where I could disconnect myself from the vision my parents had of me,” Bala said. “There I was, finally feeling the freedom. Drag is freedom by itself.”
Anoush Ellah jokes that she has been doing drag since she was born. Growing up in Toronto, Canada, she would put on shows and perform for her family and friends. “I was the little kid putting t-shirts on my head and flipping them around like they’re wigs,” she said.
Anoush Ellah was immersed in Armenian culture at a young age, which included attending Armenian day school and church and speaking the language at home. “To nobody’s surprise, I was a very flamboyant child growing up. I loved to break the rules. I would show up with spiked stud bracelets. I would tie the jacket around my waist. So I was always getting in trouble in that way. I started growing out my hair,” she said.
Eventually, the Armenian and Middle Eastern music and the pop stars like Britney Spears and the Spice Girls that she grew up listening to fused to form the drag persona Anoush Ellah, a self-described “Armenian drag pop princess.”
Gigi Aries is part of a group of artists building a budding drag scene in Armenia, “brick by brick,” in her words. The culture of drag was dormant in Armenia until December 2022, when a few people including Gigi Aries performed at a party hosted by Pink Armenia, an NGO that champions LGBTQ rights. “It created a magic. It’s like there was something inside of us waiting to be unleashed,” Gigi Aries said.
She performed to “Rise Like a Phoenix” by Conchita Wurst, an Austrian drag queen, and waved a pride flag featuring the white, pink and blue stripes of the transgender community. “Historically, drag artists are the front fighters for queer movements and queer liberty. I wanted to convey the message that drag artists are back in the center of attention. The community can feel like they have a shoulder to cry on. There’s something that they can celebrate, and there are people who could make them feel safer,” Gigi Aries said.
Some in the Armenian community believe that LGBTQ visibility and expression in general, and drag in particular, violate cultural values and traditions. In the face of criticism, drag artists insist on their deep love of Armenian heritage and express it proudly through creative performances that integrate queer and Armenian imagery and themes. It is not uncommon to see a drag artist lip sync to Armenian music, dance with the Armenian flag or advocate for Armenian causes. Many of these performances reflect deep introspection about carrying an intersectional queer Armenian identity and research into the history and culture.
VERA!, who has been a drag king for about a decade, often incorporates Armenian culture into their numbers. Their busy performance schedule includes co-hosting several shows in the San Francisco Bay Area and traveling across the country for drag festivals.
During a six-month residency called “Try, Hye!” at CounterPulse, an art center in San Francisco, California, VERA! learned traditional Armenian dances like the Tamzara and Kochari from instructors including Anoush Ellah and poet Hrayr Varaz, culminating in a show — “like a SWANA Step Up story,” VERA! joked. “I’m pretty good as a dancer, to toot my own horn, but the Michigan Hop was humbling.”
Learning the dances from queer instructors was an important part of the process for VERA! Many LGBTQ Armenians don’t get to learn the traditions and practices that are passed down within families, VERA! reflected. When alienated from a biological family, many queer Armenians turn to chosen family for knowledge about their culture.
“With my queer and trans Armenian family, everybody understands that the likelihood that your parent loves and accepts you for who you are unconditionally, completely, is low,” VERA! said. “Being Armenian to me means being connected with my queer and trans Armenian family. It’s the things that we share without speaking. It’s the way we respond to music in the same way. It’s the way that we respond to food in the same way. It’s that sense of cultural longing.”
VERA! later waved an Armenian flag on stage at Oasis, a sprawling queer nightclub in San Francisco, for a packed show that raised funds for Artsakh Armenians, featuring beloved comedian Mary Basmadjian and readings from Hrayr Varaz and Taleen Voskuni, a novelist of queer Armenian romcoms. VERA! often performs to music by Armenian musicians, including “Believe” by Cher — a crowd pleaser they call “low-hanging pomegranate fruit” — “Armenian Girl” by Lilit Hovhannisyan and “Protect the Land” by System of a Down.
Gigi Aries is also committed to staying true to her heritage through drag. “I associated Armenianness with a lot of hate and negativity, so I naturally blocked everything associated with our culture and our country and tried to find something familiar in foreign cultures… I had to come back, look inside and go back to those moments that inspired me when I was younger.”
In another number, Gigi Aries picks up an imaginary phone and lip syncs to sound bites from famous Armenian film and television moments that she grew up watching, including Harsnatsun Hyusisits, Kargin Haghordum, Vitamin Club and Pahanjvum e Milionater, as well as a historic speech by trans activist Lilit Martirosyan at the Armenian parliament.
While humorous, this performance also represented a triumphant return to Armenian culture. “For the longest time, I had this self-hate phase,” Gigi Aries reflected. “I associated Armenianness with a lot of hate and negativity, so I naturally blocked everything associated with our culture and our country and tried to find something familiar in foreign cultures… I had to come back, look inside and go back to those moments that inspired me when I was younger.”
“Now as a drag artist, it’s my job to incorporate our culture into my art, but it’s also important for me specifically as a person to not forget where I came from,” she continued.
Some drag artists hope that integrating Armenian culture with fluid gender expression can subvert strict gender norms. Anoush Ellah often dances to Armenian music in a regal taraz and headdress with a full mustache, beard and visible chest hair.
“Keeping the body hair, keeping the beard, feels right for me, but also as Armenians, we are just very hairy people,” Anoush Ellah said. “Seeing what is naturally considered masculine paired with the femininity of long hair, makeup, lashes, nails and dancing how a quote, unquote, girl would dance automatically puts it at such a paradox for people. I can sometimes see it in people’s eyes when I’m performing, the gears shifting in their mind.”
Anoush Ellah says she will spend her lifetime unlearning the shame that has been projected onto her from a young age. She remembers the first time she was made fun of and called “gay” by the older kids at Armenian school in the first grade. “I didn’t even know what that meant, but the way that it was said already had such a negative connotation,” she said. “I was just doing me, but when you’re always told something, you eventually start to internalize it.”
While Anoush Ellah embraces the feminine elements of Armenian dance, costume and culture, VERA! does the same for the masculine ones. “I really enjoy, especially in Armenian dance, doing traditional male dances. I enjoy having no gender in the dances and just doing whatever I want. If I want to dance like a ram, I can dance like a ram,” they said.
“Drag in and of itself is essentially a protest to be the person you want to be and an expression of freedom. It’s seamless to me that you would then use drag for that purpose to uplift the freedoms of others.”
In addition to queer and trans rights and inclusion, drag artists are also often vocal advocates for Armenian issues, including Armenian Genocide recognition and justice for Artsakh. “Drag in and of itself is essentially a protest to be the person you want to be and an expression of freedom. It’s seamless to me that you would then use drag for that purpose to uplift the freedoms of others,” VERA! said. “If I’m going to be out here doing Armenian dance, I’d better also be talking about Artsakh — otherwise there’s not going to be any Armenian dance.”
During the war in Artsakh, Bala would end their performances by sharing the news and history of Armenia. Bala has crafted an imaginary world and drag characters inspired in part by their longing for Armenia and a solid sense of home as an immigrant. “It’s very Armenian to have this nostalgia,” Bala said.
When they started doing drag, Bala did not tell their audiences that they were Armenian, afraid of the backlash they might face from the Armenian community.
“For a while, I thought that it wasn’t possible to be queer and Armenian. It felt like if you’re queer, you’re going to be rejected from Armenian culture, and you’re not going to be able to come back. All my surroundings were telling that as well,” Bala said, reflecting on homophobic and transphobic comments from relatives and stories of violent hate crimes against queer Armenians.
“But now they’re coming together more, after realizing that I can inspire more queer Armenians that it’s possible. It’s possible to be Armenian and be queer and be happy and thrive and be successful. This is what moves me to express it more, to say it out loud and to dive into the culture. It’s also owning it, because I deserve to be proud of being Armenian,” they continued.
Low visibility of LGBTQ identities in Armenia has been a major obstacle to establishing a drag scene. There are few LGBTQ-friendly bars or clubs in Armenia, and asking venues to host a drag show without knowing the owner could be dangerous. All drag shows run with tight security, and photos and videos are prohibited to protect the performers’ safety.
Once a venue is secured, the drag artists need permission to arrive hours before doors open to put on their costumes and makeup, since they can’t walk through the streets in drag. Gigi Aries wistfully recalls feeling free in public in Europe or the United States with “nobody paying attention to me, or the opposite of that, complimenting me.”
“We deserve a lot better living conditions that we are provided with when we’re born in this country,” Gigi Aries said.
Anoush Ellah has grown accustomed to facing backlash from within the Armenian community. Videos of several of her performances have gone viral on social media. Last year, she performed in a taraz at a gala in honor of the GALAS LGBTQ+ Armenian Society’s 25th anniversary. “The energy was incredible. It was a magical night,” Anoush Ellah recalled. Yet before the night had even ended, a video of her taking off the taraz mid-performance for an outfit change was circulating on social media, inundated with criticism that she had disrespected Armenian culture and womanhood.
The queer community, meanwhile, is thrilled by Armenian drag. VERA! recounts “the best reception — crying hugs, a very deep connection, a very deep desire to have more, which is why I do more.” “One queer Armenian person came up to me and was like, that was really meaningful for me. And we just held each other for a while. I’ll remember that hug forever,” VERA! recalled from one show.
In the meantime, Gigi Aries looks forward to greater visibility for queer and trans Armenians. She and her community of drag artists in Armenia have gone from hosting one show every few months to one show a month. In 2025, they’re aiming for a show a week.
“It’s really important to highlight these kinds of stories, so the general public knows that no matter what, we are a part of this society. We have jobs, we contribute to the economy, we make art, we use public transportation, we make it just like everybody else,” she said.
“It’s always the haters who are like, you’re not Armenian, and don’t call yourself Armenian, but by your own logic, I’m full-blooded Armenian. I can speak, read and write. I went to school growing up, so I’ve checked all your boxes. Yet I’m still not Armenian enough, because I choose to express it differently. We have the same love for our culture, yet because I love it differently or the way that I choose to express that love is different than yours, you have such hatred towards it,” Anoush Ellah said.
Lillian Avedian
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