Vice Style

As a part-time harm-reduction worker based in the Downtown Eastside (DTES) of Vancouver, Canada, I spend a couple days each week chatting with hundreds of the approximately 18,000 addicts and marginalized people crammed into the area. I recently began photographing some of these men and women, both before and after they’d gussied themselves up for a night out doing whatever it is they do—whether it’s hustling, sex-working, panhandling, carjacking, dumpster diving, or looting. It almost always involves procuring drugs.

The ten women featured in this series struggle with one addiction or another, and each falls into some of these possible stigmatized categories: HIV or hepatitis C positive, transvestite, cancer patient, drug dealer, low income, schizophrenic, bipolar, sex worker, and sexually abused. The eccentric, if not always elaborate, outfits they wear are both transformational and functional: What is used to make a dollar can also provide cover from nosy cops interested in busting the often desperate shenanigans associated with the squalor of the DTES community. During our time together I asked each of the women to explain the relative merits of their altered appearances and what else might be behind all their wig-play and costume wearing.

[Note: These ten women are not necessarily associated with bad behavior. They present themselves to the world this way for an assortment of reasons. Some are not even truly women, and all have chosen to use fake names.]