Cherdonna Shinatra is the stage name of Jody Kuehner (born 1979),
[
] a
Seattle
Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...
-based, American dancer,
drag queen
A drag queen is a person, usually male, who uses Drag (entertainment), drag clothing and makeup to imitate and often exaggerate Femininity, female gender signifiers and gender roles for entertainment purposes. Historically, drag queens have ...
and
performance artist
Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...
.
[
] Kuehner won the
''Stranger'' Genius Award in Performance in 2015.
[
]
Career
Performance style
Kuehner has been called a "female impersonator impersonator"
and describes her own performance as Cherdonna as "a female-bodied person, presenting as a male-bodied person, presenting as a female".
[
] She has been mistaken for a man by some audience members who don't expect to see the "exaggerat
dfemininity" displayed by a drag persona to have a female body.
[
] After a performance in Seattle she had her breasts grabbed by a person who expected to find a prosthetic,
and she performed onstage several times with a male partner before he realized she was not also male.
Keuhner incorporates many elements into her performances, including dance, theater, drag, burlesque, glitter, celebrity impersonations, audience interaction, and clowning.
Dance instruction
Kuehner was
artist in residence
Artist-in-residence (also Writer-in-residence), or artist residencies, encompass a wide spectrum of artistic programs that involve a collaboration between artists and hosting organisations, institutions, or communities. They are programs that pr ...
and instructor at Velocity Dance Center in 2014.
[
]
Personal life
Kuehner describes herself as queer.
[
]
References
Further reading
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Shinatra, Cherdonna
1980s births
Living people
American drag queens
LGBTQ people from Washington (state)
Artists from Seattle
21st-century American dancers
American queer women
American queer artists
21st-century American LGBTQ people
American LGBTQ dancers
University of South Florida alumni
Year of birth missing (living people)