Being poor and gay in New York during the 90s wasn’t all Paris Is Burning drag-realness. There was a darker side to all of that fabulous, fierce and ferocious stuff. Many transvestites and transsexuals worked as prostitutes and hung around the city’s meatpacking district. Japanese-born New York resident and photographer Katsu Naito began shooting photos of the trans-prostitutes he saw at the time and earlier this year finally published the pics in his book West Side Rendezvous.
VICE: So most of these photos are more than 20 years old, how come you’re publishing them now?
Katsu Naito: 15 years ago, images like these wouldn’t have been so easily accepted, you know? But, 20 years later, all of the sex workers have moved on and there’s not so much of a stigma attached to this kind of thing anymore.
