Those women that wear lots of make-up and prance around in skimpy clothing are totally superficial, right? If she's extra sexy, she must be silly, right?

Don’t get it twisted. Cherry Galette’s gratuitous glitter is vital.

Galette is a burlesque dancer and choreographer and her work is anything but shallow. She shakes and she shimmies in a repertoire of resistance. Forces of colonization, racism and gentrification are no match for the flick of her hips, she’s transforming the narrative as she embodies it.

Galette is obsessed with stories of migration. She’s particularly interested in meshing installation and interactive performance. She was the recipient of an Artist Trust grant from the Washington State Arts Commission in 2006. She is co-producer of "Mangos with Chili," the only touring cabaret of queer and trans people of color in North America.

She’s been involved with the production of more than 60 shows in the last four years. "Fog City Necropolis: An Interactive Haunted House," told the story of shrinking land availability and economic struggle. San Francisco’s dead (Tupac, Frida Kahlo, Janis Joplin among them) were evicted and displaced from their peaceful resting places. "Before We Were Named," which premiered at the National Queer Arts Festival 2010, was an experimental performance project based on historic world fairs, and featured artists of color deconstructing notions of barbarism and exoticism.

This Monday, March 21, Galette and Hellfire Cinema present" Score! The Queer Dating Game, Variety Show, & Monday Night Cruising Spot." In June, she will perform at the National Queer Arts festival in "Scene’s Unseen," a border-crossing drama set in various locations around the world, such as the 1931 La Placita immigration raid in Los Angeles and the military installation at Subic Bay, Philippines.

Galette comes from a family of musicians. As a child, she performed shows with her cousins.

“In many ways, we would imitate the grown-ups around us,” she told me. “We made a band and made music, but there were sparkly accessories and gratuitous glitter.”

Pretty shoes that pinch

Galette is Chicana and Moroccan and incorporates traditional dances of her culture into her burlesque performance. She studied Arabic dance extensively, specifically belly dance. She is committed to preserving the culture.

“I think it’s important that the bodies that belong to the tradition actually learn it, so they can pass it on,” she said.

Her family is obviously a revitalizing source of inspiration and strength. Her brother and sister, Galette said, are “the best allies a queer girl could ever have.” She remains close with her parents.

“They still live in that tiny town in the wild, wild west. My mother is wonderful, witty, sharp and critical in a humorous way. Being very direct is one of her gifts for surviving, being able to tell it like it is. My father is a vivacious, animated, talented musician who wears pretty shoes even though they pinch his feet. He’s received all kinds of recognition and grants. He taught me to hope.

"My family could lift people’s hearts and make them forget about their worries, give them reason to survive another day or another week.”

Galette was the first of her family to go to college and now her work has seen the stage at more than 19 academic institutions, from University of California, Berkeley, to Brown University. After high school, she moved from a small town in Washington, to Smith College on the East Coast. Unlike many of her middle-class counterparts, she didn’t create the distance in order to get away from her parents. She was outed as queer at 15 and said she felt that she had to leave in order to avoid homophobic violence.

“It was a terrible feeling of exile, not being able to go back because I feared for my life. It was pretty traumatic. It’s something that I struggle with till this day.”
 
Oakland as a mecca

Before Galette moved to Oakland, she observed that it seemed like a mecca for queer people of color.

“Now that I live here, I often think about the spirits and stories that the sidewalk holds,” Galette said. “It’s important for me, as I walk about my day, to listen to the stories and wish good intentions for the streets that I walk upon and the neighbors that I live with.

“It bothers me, when I see white queers moving into spaces that were traditionally communities of color. I even recognize my own privilege, moving into a neighborhood as an outsider. Even though I’m a person of color, at this moment in life I have a fair amount of class privilege.

“Still, I’m proud to represent Oakland when I perform on national stages," Galette continued. "One summer, an organizer friend decided to have a ‘shipwrecked’ themed birthday party. Costumes were encouraged. I went all out – amazing swimsuit, full stage makeup and hair, vintage accessories. I arrived at the party and not a single person was dressed in costume! An attendee asked me if I was a ‘Vegas showgirl’. ‘Oh no, I’m an Oakland Showgirl!’ The label stuck.

"Oakland’s rich history of struggle, survival, resilience and working towards racial justice is one that I carry with me when I tour. If an emcee says I'm from San Francisco, I get upset! I take politics, movement building and working towards radical change as seriously as I take my pasties.

“Oakland seems to be a place that people run to - queers that need community - to heal some things. We get a lot of seekers here.”

As Galette moves from personal and political, comedy and the abstract, steamy and sensual, sacred and profane, she twists and contorts and inverts the status quo. Her erotic invocation is spiritual, at its center.

“I’ve always been intrigued by what motivates people to believe as they do. People in prayer, or in any kind of ritual that involves some wish. I may disagree with conservative religious belief, but I definitely get intrigued by articulated expression of longing and desire. I wanted to find a way to embody that physically, to inject queer narrative.

"It’s almost like prayer - people gathering together to witness and how transformational that can be. I’m a person who’s motivated by deep feelings of love, it’s at the core of everything I do. The fact that we are all alive in these beautiful bodies, with these hearts that have the capacity to love is a miraculous thing."

Don’t miss out on the dating game on Monday.

“Come to Score,” Galette said, “It's very humorous! And there's a giant sparkly spinning wheel!”