jürgen klauke

MASCULIN FEMININ

Modern glamour is rooted in gender play. By producing ambiguity and erotic tension, it resists fixation and certainty. Cross-dressing is not an accessory to glamour but an impetus, creating seduction and mystery.

Among the many performance artists of the 1970s, the cult German artist Jürgen Klauke (born 1943) emerged as a pioneering figure through his early explorations of transgender expression and cross-dressing. His performances are a prime example of how avant-garde body art influenced mainstream pop culture, from David Bowie and Brian Eno to today’s fashion.

Klauke’s Masculin / Feminin opened a dialogue with art history and pushed glamour into a zone of metamorphosis. Gender dissolved, species merged: human and animal met in figures like the Minotaur, the Centaur, the Sphinx, and the Satyr. Cross-dressing was no longer marginal — it became the pulse of glamour itself, producing mystery and desire, and recalling a primordial seduction…