RuPaul’s Drag Race season 13 will feature a transmasculine contestant for the first time.
On Wednesday (9 December), the cast of Drag Race’s 13th season was announced, with a new group of queens competing to be named America’s next drag superstar.
Among them is Gottmik, a Los Angeles-based makeup artist who is the first transgender man to compete on the show.
He is known for working with the likes of Paris Hilton, Kaia Gerber and Lil Nas X, who he helped transform into Nicki Minaj drag this Halloween.
“I need to be the first trans winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race, period,” Gottmik, 23, declared in his promotional video.
Describing how he “liked to play with gender” in his drag, he continued: “The more and more I got comfortable with my gender identity, the more I got to play with the drag Gottmik side. Now that it’s solely my art, it’s just the best thing in the world.
“It means so much for me to be on the show right now, especially being a trans guy going in, a feminine perspective of a trans guy. The trans movement is getting so big, so powerful, so strong.”
Over the years, Drag Race has been criticised for its lack of diversity when it comes to transgender performers.
While a number of trans women have competed on the show, season nine’s Peppermint was the first to have come out prior to the show airing and identify herself as trans throughout the series.
RuPaul’s Drag Race season 13 will premiere on 1 January on VH1 in the US, with the new episodes expected to follow soon after on Netflix for UK viewers.
