Gelatin silver print
Signed and numbered
11 x 14 inches
(Edition of 20)
16 x 20 inches
(Edition of 10)
From the series, "Shoot the Arrow: A Portrait of The World Famous *BOB*"
This photograph is offered by ClampArt, located in New York City.
Please note that prices increase as editions sell.
The World Famous *BOB* is a female burlesque dancer based in Brooklyn who is a central part of the neo burlesque movement that began in New York City in the 1990s. Raised on an isolated 115-acre farm in the California Valley, she renamed herself “Bob” after Robert Smith of The Cure when she was a teenager and was later crowned “The World Famous *BOB*”—now her legal name—by her drag mother, Jackie Beat, when she performed in her first Wigstock. Born female, she nevertheless aspired to be a drag queen from a young age, which led to years of searching for her true gender identity, drug abuse, hustling, and alienation from family. A self-described “female-female spiritual transsexual,” this intense, often painful personal journey eventually drew her to burlesque, which allowed her to embrace her femininity in a way that finally made her comfortable. She currently shares her life story with college students in a highly moving, theatrical one-person show, “One Man Show: The True Story of Miss World Famous *BOB*,” in order to spread a message of hope and survival to the younger queer and queer-friendly community.
Amy Touchette is a photographer based in New York City. Her photographs explore themes of social connectedness by assembling documentary portrait typologies.
Trained at the International Center of Photography in New York City, Touchette began her artistic career as a writer and painter, earning a BA in Literature and Studio Art and an MA in Literature. She also works as a freelance photography writer for publications such as PDNedu, Rangefinder, and Emerging Photographer magazines, and writes an ongoing series about street photography for the tutorial website Envato Tuts+.
Touchette’s first monograph, "Shoot the Arrow: A Portrait of The World Famous *BOB*," was published and funded by Un-Gyve Press (Boston, 2013). Other publications include The New York Times (August 2016 and July 2012), the New York Observer (June 2015), Esquire magazine, Russia (May 2011), and Loudmouth Press’s fine art book, "Why Are You Surprised I’m Still Here?" (November 2010).
Touchette's photographs have exhibited nationally and internationally, including Moscow MoMA (Russia), Leica Gallery Warszawa (Poland), Hamburg Triennial of Photography (Germany), and at the US Embassies in Vienna, Austria; and Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, respectively. Touchette has given artist lectures at B&H Superstore, The School of Visual Arts, and The School of the International Center of Photography, among others.