Orlando Lansdorf (1965 – 6 March 2021) was a Surinamese-Dutch

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 HIV activist who received media attention in the Netherlands. Landsdorf was born in

Paramaribo Paramaribo ( , , ) is the capital city, capital and largest city of Suriname, located on the banks of the Suriname River in the Paramaribo District. Paramaribo has a population of roughly 241,000 people (2012 census), almost half of Suriname's p ...

Suriname Suriname, officially the Republic of Suriname, is a country in northern South America, also considered as part of the Caribbean and the West Indies. It is a developing country with a Human Development Index, high level of human development; i ...

. He moved to

Veghel Veghel () is a town and a former municipality in Southern Netherlands. On 1 January 2017 Veghel, together with Schijndel and Sint-Oedenrode, merged into a new municipality called Meierijstad. This created the largest municipality of the provi ...

in the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

. Landsdorf was the father of two children with a

lesbian A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexu ...

mother. In the 1990s, he was active in Safe Seks Guerrilla, a performance group to raise awareness of HIV, and to promote safe sex. Later, he was diagnosed

HIV The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of '' Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the im ...

positive himself. He worked as a bartender at

Café 't Mandje Café 't Mandje is a bar in Amsterdam, Netherlands. It is located in Zeedijk street and was opened in 1927 by Bet van Beeren, herself a lesbian. The Amsterdam Museum holds a small replica of 't Mandje. 't Mandje is often presented as the fir ...

on the

Zeedijk Zeedijk (''English'': "Sea Levee, dike") is a street in the old centre of Amsterdam. The street is the northern and eastern boundary of De Wallen red-light district and runs between Prins Hendrikkade and Nieuwmarkt. Historically an area riddled ...

in Amsterdam. Lansdorf died in his sleep on 6 March 2021, aged 55.

References

External links

Personal website
(in English and Dutch) * 1965 births 2021 deaths Dutch drag queens Dutch gay entertainers 21st-century Surinamese LGBTQ people HIV/AIDS activists People with HIV/AIDS People from Paramaribo Place of death missing Surinamese emigrants to the Netherlands {{Netherlands-bio-stub