Christeene Vale, known mononymously as Christeene, is an American drag queen, performance artist, singer-songwriter and rapper. Christeene is noted for untraditional, "terrorist drag," which features him wearing torn-up clothing, stringy matted black wigs, and heavy and smeared makeup with aims to expose hypocrisy and intolerance.
Christeene is Soileau's second drag character, his first being Rebecca Havemeyer, who is similar to Barry Humphries' Dame Edna. "When Christeene came out of me," said Soileau, "I was searching for something that had the action of a switchblade in my pocket -- a character I could really put on quickly, but affect people in a much stronger way. Something strong enough to channel things inside of me that needed to come out -- more aggressive things. When everything aligned properly, Christine kind of just appeared. I found the wig and went to town... Both characters speak honestly from within me, but Christeene addresses issues that Rebecca does not. There's a lot of political and social commentary going on. It allows me to try to process and understand me, Paul -- as a queer, a Southern boy. Someone understanding my environment and my own social realms. I can push it out through this Christeene character." Christeene's first public appearance was at Camp Camp, a queer open-mic show in Austin, Texas. In 2011, Christeene was a resident at the CentralTrakArtist Residency in Dallas, TX. For his debut albumWaste Up, Kneez Down, Christeene started a successfulKickstarter campaign, meeting his goal of $10,000. Christeene contributed to the 2012 art magazineSatanica, which was printed in a limited edition of 350 copies. Other contributors included Bruce La Bruce and Michael Alig.
Music
Christeene's music videos are made by filmmakerPJ Raval. The final budget for each music video is around $200. For Christeene's first music video, "Fix My Dick", Raval borrowed a camera and they spent "about $20 on baby props from a thrift store." They finished the video in one day. The music video for "African Mayonnaise" was nominated for a SXSW Competition Award in 2012. Paul Soileau was an artist-in-residence in 2012 at CentralTrak. He and PJ Raval developed new work for an experimental collaborative project entitled, "The O.T. ", giving Christeene a brief and much needed vacation.
Artistry
Christeene describes themselves as a genderqueer "drag terrorist," and is influenced by Jayne County and Bruce LaBruce's use of non-heteronormative gender roles and sexuality. Chelsea Weathers of Art Lies compared Christeene's "drag terrorism," sexual and racial commentary to Vaginal Davis: "the reflection Christeene offers includes the necessarily unsanitized underbelly of queer experience—the ambiguity of identifying as queer and the anger and humor that is part and parcel of that experience."
