PERMISSION is a glimpse of what melanated people look like outside of the gaze of dominant society, where they feel safe, protected and celebrated. This exhibit is a collection of images taken by nine photographers given exclusive access to the Debauchery Ball over the last 19 years.

In that, we are inviting up to three Chicago-based POC visual artists to submit work that speaks to melanated sensuality to also be included in this daring and unique installation. Works can be sculptural, painted or photographed with the number of pieces dependent on size.

Interested artists click here: https://forms.gle/TgZKr9UgP8kyF3UQ8 

Once upon a time some of the liveliest people in the Western zodiac born under particular signs were forced to celebrate their entrance into this world in the wintertime, specifically in the Midwest. Such an egregious error and insulting assault has been corrected with WBR, a summertime Debauchery celebration.

PAINTED, DARK & DIVINE is a living exhibition of AfroEroticism, dance, and Black divinity. Think Met Ball but WAY nakeder, sweatier and more Afrocentric!

The Afrofuturistic Black BDSM-themed flagship of the series. 19 years running, the DBall is the defining celebration borne out of the sensual and electric nature of Chicago’s House music culture. Today it is an audience revered, protected space for POCs to marvel and be marveled at as living works of art and experience an uninhibited abandon they may not have known they needed. It’s a sensory engaging feast designed 2 fill its attendees up with joy and a greater sense of self simply by being their most beautiful selves.

Can you feel a brand new day? Honoring the hemisphere’s actual new year/Spring equinox, the doors of the “Church” open to costume, dance, and sweat into the wee hours of the night in one of the most celebratory cities in the country, New Orleans! The wonderful world of Oz (in the spirit of “the Wiz”) is the theme. Attendees wear elaborate costumes of red, gold, or green; to be seen.