*The Panel*
2024
Photograph on vinyl
60” x 117”

Mr. Society of 23

2024
Photographic series + installation

Mr. Society of 23 is a photographic series and immersive installation that documents the Society of 23’s annual beauty pageant. Installed at the Saugatuck Center for the Arts, the exhibition offers audiences a behind-the-scenes view of the event, from rehearsals and preparation to the final coronation. Drawing from the spectacle and structure of traditional pageantry, I use photography, video, performance, and installation to reveal the physical labor, emotional intensity, and ritualized performance required to compete for the title of Mr. Society of 23.

By appropriating the beauty pageant as a site for transformation rather than exclusion, I reposition it as a space for underrepresented bodies. The Society of 23 is itself an underrepresented community, composed entirely of my own gay and brown body. I perform each brother, transforming myself into multiple contestants who submit to choreography, judgment, and competition. The work treats the pageant stage as both platform and pressure point where visibility, vulnerability, and belonging collide.

The installation invites visitors to enter into the pageant environment themselves. Bright lights, a shimmering backdrop, and a live video feed place viewers in the role of both performer and spectator, while large-scale photographs depict the brothers rehearsing, preparing backstage, and being crowned. Through performance, repetition, and competition, Mr. Society of 23 asks what it means to be seen, evaluated, and celebrated.