The story of a bio-queen who reveals the influence that both drag and her persona Ivy Lickens have had on her life and development. Who knew embracing your femininity could be so empowering? Meet law student Scarlett Blue (21), from Serbia.
“All my life, I was a very insecure kid. Growing up, I felt uncomfortable about my male-like behaviour and wondered if I was just an odd kinda girl. I did have that emo-alternative style, but all the others girls around me wore dresses and braided their hair. I was the weird girl, and it weighed on me. That is, up until I discovered drag in 2016.
By pure accident, actually. I was scrolling on Tumblr and saw a GIF of Khloe Kardashian as a judge on the show RuPauls’ drag race and was really amused. Me being my inquisitive self, of course, needed to see what the show was about. It just seemed so funny. And then I found it, and guess what? No one saw me for days. I inhaled the show like it was air. I became absolutely hooked. “What an amazing world of fantasy, of being yourself, but the fantasy version of yourself!” I kept thinking. At the end of that marathon, I felt renewed and like I had a new outlook on life. And I actually did. From then on, I embraced my individuality more than before and tried to care less about what others thought.
It also pushed me to try new things, such as exploring different sides of myself. I started wearing whatever hairstyle I wanted, colouring my hair in electric blue, going crazy with makeup, meeting new people and exploring new horizons. Each and every one of these things brought me something. And even if it did take a second, it also did my dear drag alter ego, Ivy Lickens. Ivy is a woman in an identity crisis. She is strong, but she is weak; she is a badass and a softie, a lustful succubus and a hopeless romantic. She is everything a woman is and everything a woman is not. She’s an uncensored print of who I am, what I’m feeling and what I want to express. Her entire appearance reflects those things each time I perform, and I love that. I’m free to experiment with different looks every time.
My first appearance as Ivy Lickens was probably in 2018 in Serbia. My fabulous drag mother, the illustrious Dajana Ho, asked me if I wanted to participate in a show about baby drag queens. Dajana Ho is one of the first queens I ever saw perform and the man behind the character Drazen, who grew to be a close friend of mine. Through our conversations about social issues, he decided women should also have a platform to perform drag. This is what gave me the courage to jumpstart Ivy Lickens. Dajana is a complicated woman, full of demons and theatricality showcased by her many talents on and off stage. A true voice of the people and an artist to the fullest extent.
The main difference between a drag queen and a bio queen is gender. If we just go with the flow, let’s say that drag queens are males, men dressed up in drag, and bio queens, are biological women who take on a persona of drag. Ultimately, they are the same: you have exaggerated makeup and have the performance aspect. As a lover of makeup and drag aside, I jumped at the opportunity to participate because I actually find it crucial to hear female voices in a world where you’re impersonating them. For some people, that’s a subject that’s highly up for debate. Still, I think everybody should be allowed to do drag, that is especially trans people. They have been very discriminated in that world.
I have also encountered some resistance as a bio-queen. People tell me that I’m not a real queen and should leave performances to gay men expressing themselves. I found this ironic since, in their view, it’s an art form impersonating women that should exclude a bisexual woman expressing her view of femininity in a world where that question is contested daily. Yet, this didn’t stop me from performing, and I luckily had a fantastic drag family that never excluded me. I, too, think of it as an art form: it’s not who you are; it’s what you do. And therefore, nobody should be discriminated against in the world of drag.
But anyways, Ivy Lickens, whose name actually came from a complete joke. As a kid, I always wanted to have the nickname Ivy because of the plant poison ivy. Of course, it never stuck as everyone refused to call me that. I was also inspired by Ivy Winters, a queen on RuPauls’ show whose character and entire aesthetic I was very fond of. She’s really more of an honest and developed version of me. Well, an exaggerated one, which I achieve aesthetically by taking the makeup I do daily and pushing it to the extreme with more prominent brows, lips, eyeliner, and eyeshadow. Ivys’ style is not set in stone, and that’s what I love about her. She’s unpredictable and incessantly fabulous. I also wanted to play on Winters and lickens, because lesbians lick.
What I like to do with my drag, which I regrettably don’t do as often anymore due to time constraints with law school, and the elephant in the room of a global pandemic, is I embody different characters. I like to play with the different facets of femininity. For example, my first track performance focused on that boss bitch vibe. I had just gotten broken up with, so, coming out of a four year-long relationship, I was determined to make myself feel like I was on top of my game. I lip-synched to a variety of artists in that performance. I incorporated the theme song of the show Lucifer as an introduction, included Fergalicious by Fergie because, of course, I had to, and ended with reference to the elimination of BenDeLaCreme, which was a self-elimination. Instead of eliminating a bottom queen as the winner, BenDeLa used white-out to eliminate herself, as she could no longer take the pressure of the competition and eliminating her fellow friends. Following that, I thought it would be a fun way to finish my almost 10-minute-long set instead of just walking off at the end of the song.
I remember feeling invigorated after my premiere as if I’d been reborn. There was a new part of me that I had to explore. So, it only made sense that I chose these breakup-revenge songs where the woman was stronger coming out of the relationship. The more I got into the drag performance scene, the more I delved into my creative side. There was a phase during which I was keen on taking after Disney characters. I remember doing a nostalgia show where I brought back the Suite Life of Zack and Cody, Hannah Montana, and That’s So Raven. I also did one where I took the Divas of the 80s, the powerful women with a hint of masculinity in them with their leather jackets. One of my favourite performances was when I integrated female vulnerability. I progressively took my makeup and lashes off throughout the show. I wanted to offer insight into what’s underneath and how a woman can be broken down. I remember that silence, and those eyes, while I wiped myself of all the makeup. And the cheers when I collapsed and the song finished. Although I got an extensive amount of compliments afterwards, I think only a few people understood that the performance was meant to show vulnerability and the relationship mask falling off. I believe many mistook it instead as sheer insanity linked to heartbreak.
I really do try to embody different aspects of females and femininity in every single one of my performances. That is because in real life, even though I have a lot of makeup on, or “my mug is beat”, as we like to say in the community, I am a very male energy-oriented person. I do behave myself in a stereotypically male way. So, I enjoy embracing that little femininity that I don’t get to otherwise. Hindsight, drag has taught me that every single morning, whether you’re an actual drag queen or not, you are putting on a drag persona. Not everyone in your life gets to see how you are at home. Take makeup, for example. I began to see makeup as a means of creative expression, where through the colours or style I choose, I’d communicate how and what I’m feeling that day. When I got comfortable doing that and people around me grew accustomed to the striking, colourful makeup, that’s when I really started seeing how I asserted myself. I grew into a version of myself that didn’t fear the repercussions of what people said about me because I realised it just didn’t matter at the end of the day. I even have a tattoo on my thigh that says, “We’re all born naked and the rest is drag,” a quote from RuPaul which I love to look at because it reminds me that it’s not only on stage that we play a character and a persona. We all do it subconsciously daily. I think that if we all just dropped the mask and were to be whoever we are, even under the guise of three tons of makeup, chains or heels, we still are an aspect of ourselves. One that we are maybe too scared to show off because we fear judgement.
RuPauls’ Season Six winner Bianca Del Rio always says, “Not today Satan.” Every time I encounter a difficult situation, I say it aloud. With the exception, of course, when I’m in class. Imagine screaming that out while talking about criminal law surrounded by other law students. Anywhere outside of that scenario, you’ll find me chanting that tagline which comes from the feeling of “this person is testing me, this person wants to see me in a mug shot; this is not going to happen, you’re not going to influence my vibe. Not today, Satan, be gone.” It does sound really dumb when you’re having a casual conversation with somebody, and then out of nowhere, you look at them and say something like “I’m a fucking Libra, Hiii”, BUT it does make people laugh. I enjoy making people smile or happier, even if it is out of sheer confusion.
Regardless of whether you are part of the community itself, just a spectator, or simply find it interesting or fascinating, there’s one message that every human can take from this. And that is, as RuPaul said, “If you can’t love yourself, how in the hell are you gonna love somebody else?” And I’ve got all of the Kings and Queens to thank for that.”
