Vegas Magazine - Niche Media - There is a place beyond the crowds, beyond the ropes, where dreams are realized and success is celebrated. You are invited.
Issue link: http://digital.greengale.com/i/533211
cont ra st to t hei r somewhat qu iet l i fe on New Zealand's rural South Island. Five years later, Russ admits that the city isn't a typi- cal destination for creative types, nor did she feel instantly at home. "We made a concerted effort to check out what's happening here," she says, "but it takes a while to get a feel for the place, as it's quite tran- sient. People come for a short time and leave, so the locals sit back a bit and wait to see if you're one of them. But after a year, that felt like a marker." Las Vegas has proved to be a fertile source of inspi- rat ion for t he a r t ist. Wit h her rockabilly-inf lected style sense, Russ was drawn to the local alternative- music scene, but nothing captured her attention more than the burlesque underground. She remains transfixed by it, hunting down the shows every week, often driving to nondescript strip malls in quiet parts of the city for unadvertised performances. Russ sees burlesque as staunchly feminist, offering a safe environment that encourages wom- en's creat ive expression a nd fosters fema le empower ment. "I love t he showgirls [on the Strip]," she says, "but there are a lot more limitations on who can be a showgirl—you've got to be six foot tall. But in burlesque you can be all sizes and shapes, and it's a lot freer than the constrained shows." (Despite her enthusiasm, the gamine, soft-spoken Russ says she's never been tempted to give burlesque a try herself.) Also among Russ's favorite haunts around the city and in nearby towns like Barstow are secondhand bookstores, which she trawls for anything visually a r rest ing. She's especia lly keen on 1960s a nd '70s pornography, whose Hipstamatic-style color balance and acres of f lesh are well-suited to her aesthetic. "I just love the depictions of female sensuality," she says. "What is seductive—and how?" In preparation for a new piece, Russ will often rip through a pile of recent purchases, blade in hand. "I have envelopes with legs, arms, lips, f lowers. Once they're cut out, they get put in a little categorizing system." At the moment she's bubbling with excitement, ready to tear into a partic- ularly noteworthy find from a couple of days earlier: a copy of Vogue Italia from 1984, full of models who are big-haired, firm- f leshed, and oozing greed-is-good glamour. Russ shrugs off concerns over shredding these period periodicals: "If it's in a thrift store, it's fair game." Only once has she ever unearthed a magazine she considered too pre- cious to repurpose in her work. She found it years ago in a bookstore in Wellington, New Zealand's artsiest city. "It's a little pornography maga- zine—very early, probably 1960s, and it's tiny but in color," Russ says, nearly swooning. "The models are multiracial, and you can tell for the time it was quite out there. It actually feels really quite unique, because you hardly ever see these around." She pauses. "I don't think I could ever cut that one up." V "I love fi nding things other people have discarded, like old prints from the 1960s that people used to have above the mantelpiece." —J.K. Russ VEGASMAGAZINE.COM 83