Bonded by Ballroom: What Viral TikTokers and Iconic Ballroom Leaders See For Its Future
"Ballroom is family. It's happiness. It's just everything," 16-year-old Nevaeh Autumn tells Seventeen. If you're unfamiliar with her name, you've most certainly seen a video or two of Nevaeh and her friends voguing at their performing arts high school in New York City. With over 28.1 million likes on TikTok and her most popular video garnering over 21.7 million views, Nevaeh and her seven friends all believe in celebrating the ballroom scene, where voguing began with a road paved by its LGBTQ+ founders.
For the queer community, the ballroom scene is more than just the glitz and glamour of up-tempo House music tracks, jaw-dropping spins and dips, and precise hands or floorwork. It’s a home, a hub of love and support that serves as a sanctuary for those in need. Balls are social gatherings within the LGBTQ+ community where categorized dance routines and flawless runway walks are performed and judged by a panel.
According to History.com, Harlem's Hamilton Lodge No. 710 hosted regular drag balls as early as the post-Civil War era. These underground events grew in popularity during the Harlem Renaissance and even more as House ballroom emerged in the early 1970s. Then and now, houses serve as chosen families and provide guidance, acceptance, and love for many of those often ostracized because of their sexuality and/or gender identity.
Exposure to the ballroom scene through shows like FX's Pose and HBO Max's Legendary inspires queer youth like Diego, one of Nevaeh's fellow dancers and the only LGBTQ+ person in their videos, to be themselves. "Legendary and Pose has definitely influenced my style by making me feel freer." While he'd usually rock "regular clothes," Diego says he switched it up and proudly wears bell bottoms and crop tops. "I'm getting more comfortable with showing skin because, in order to exceed and do well in the ballroom scene, you have to be confident."
It’s more than just dancing for Nevaeh, Diego, their friends Maya, CeCe, Tati, Gabby, Natalia, and their video director Alyssa. They know their stuff. Each member of this crew can recite the five elements of Vogue Femme (catwalk, hands, spins and dips, duckwalk, and floor performance) like clockwork. They even work on perfecting their skills by taking vogue classes hosted by House ballroom stars, making it clear that their interest in the scene goes beyond what viewers see on TikTok. This crew is dedicated to celebrating and not appropriating the community they’ve grown to know and love.
While TikToks like Neveah’s MoanaBih and Instagram accounts like Best Of Vogue and Old School Ballroom make it easy to discover up-and-coming names and pay homage to veterans who paved the way, gaining access to the ballroom community wasn’t always so easy. According to Pose choreographer, LGBTQ+ creator and advocate, and runway assassin Twiggy Pucci Garçon (who uses she/they pronouns), "ballroom was significantly underground" when she first hit the scene in 2004. Despite being disqualified, aka "chopped," in their ballroom debut after friends unknowingly signed Twiggy up for a more advanced category, she's been scoring tens across the board ever since. As a runway choreographer on Pose, co-writer of Kiki, and newly-minted documentary film director, Twiggy works diligently to ensure the LGBTQ+ community is represented accurately.
While ballroom has had "cycles of going in and out mainstream," Twiggy encourages everyone interested in the scene to go beyond social media engagement and do some research. "Discover the history of ballroom, why it exists, who made it, and who it's for," Twiggy advises. "Ballroom picks its people. There was a person who saw something in me that brought me around, and that's usually how it is. If ballroom calls you, you'll know if you're being called to it or if you should stay in your place and admire it."
Admiring the scene also comes with acknowledging the trends it has set in pop culture and giving the community its just due. Many of the makeup looks we love, hairstyles we rock, and language we use originated in the LGBTQ+ community and the ballroom scene. If you've ever "read" someone for filth, "thrown shade," or said "it's giving very much," then you've unknowingly participated in the culture cultivated by the LGBTQ+ and ballroom communities.
As technology continues to advance, so does ballroom. Content like Neveah's TikTok videos and series like HBO's Legendary only scratch the surface of what’s next for ballroom. Meta created a Metaverse Culture Series where it debuted Dream House, an immersive virtual reality space curated by a diverse range of LGBTQ+ community leaders and creators.
Legendary judge and literal ballroom legend Leiomy Maldonado shared with Seventeen about her experience in ballroom during an interview in the Dream House. Founder of the House of Amazon, Leiomy, aka the Wonder Woman of Vogue, changed the game when she ushered in her infamous dramatic vogue style in the early 2000s.
"Through voguing, I learned to be myself. I learned to love my flaws as well as my gifts," Leiomy says. "I was able to tap into emotions that I didn't know how to express verbally especially being a young teen transitioning at a young age, not knowing about the journey itself, and not having much research at the time."
With access to more information and support readily available, Leiomy is looking forward to exploring and reimagining ballroom culture and its traditions in innovative ways. "I'm excited to throw an event or a dance class to teach people how to vogue in the Metaverse. It's a place where it's fun," she says. "You can be who you want to be in this Metaverse. It's a way to bring a lot of people together who are maybe not open to being social in person or people who are shy and feel like they don't have a place in the world. The Metaverse is a place where they can feel more comfortable expressing themselves through movement."
As more people find their way to the community online, ballroom's message still translates IRL, too. "Ballroom has something to say to the world, and it has a lot to teach the world about self-worth, self-expression, community organizing, gender, sexuality, art and design, performance, healing, and justice," Twiggy says. Lucky for us all, social media has given us a front-row seat to what's to come. "In my perfect world, I see ballroom being able to sustain itself in all the ways it wants for itself," she adds. "I would like to see ballroom with intentionality and with resources sustain itself in a way that it moves in and out of whatever space, whether it's in and out of the underground, in and out of the mainstream, off and on the TV screen, however whichever direction it wants to move it's on one accord and self-sustaining."
Parts of this interview have been edited and condensed for clarity.
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