Dianne Torr

Diane Torr was born in Ontario, Canada. When she was four, she moved with her family to Aberdeen, Scotland, where she spent her childhood.

After graduating from Dartington College of Arts in Devon, Diane returned to North America to develop her career as an interdisciplinary artist, working in the fields of dance, performance, installation, and film. She lived in New York from 1976-2002, and was an integral part of the downtown art scene, presenting at arts venues such as Franklin Furnace and The Kitchen. She received her Master of Fine Arts degree from Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. Torr is best known for her performances as a male impersonator, and as an international pioneer of drag king culture. She has toured her performances and taught Man-for-a Day workshops in North America, Europe and Asia, and has featured on US and BBC television. In 2002 she returned to Glasgow, where she is a visiting lecturer at the Glasgow School of Art.

Torr?s performance Drag Kings and Subjects features prominently in the documentary film Venus Boyz (2002). Sex, Drag and Males Roles; Investigating Gender as Performance, a book that respresents and contextualises her work, co-written with Stephen Bottoms, is forthcoming from University of Michigan Press.