{"id":6329,"date":"2024-08-04T08:44:32","date_gmt":"2024-08-04T08:44:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/drag-performer-on-finding-empowerment-after-childhood-cancer\/"},"modified":"2024-08-04T08:44:32","modified_gmt":"2024-08-04T08:44:32","slug":"drag-performer-on-finding-empowerment-after-childhood-cancer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/drag-performer-on-finding-empowerment-after-childhood-cancer\/","title":{"rendered":"Drag performer on finding empowerment after childhood cancer"},"content":{"rendered":"


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\"TwmTwm Rowley <\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Teifi says their drag alter ego Anniben has been “a saviour for me” <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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After enduring years of gruelling treatment for cancer as a child, Teifi Rowlands was left self-conscious about their appearance and uncomfortable in their own skin. <\/p>\n

But performing as drag alter ego Anniben has been a way of processing trauma and finding empowerment.<\/p>\n

“It’s really been a saviour for me,” said Teifi.<\/p>\n

Teifi was diagnosed with a tumour behind the eye at the age of six and spent a year as an inpatient in hospital, facing numerous rounds of chemotherapy and radiotherapy. <\/p>\n

Now 21, they were finally discharged from their paediatric oncologist clinic in March.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"PhilPhil Jones Jeffreys<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Teifi performs in both English and Welsh<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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“I’ve had some severe body dysmorphia… half my face looks different now, on one side I’ve got a flatter face, no eyebrow, my eye is sunken and my lip is like kind of more pushed one way,” they said. <\/p>\n

“But with the make-up and the drag I can control how my face looks so I can eliminate these imperfections, if you want us to call them that, or I can lean into it and make more of a spectacle of it and make it kind of a badge of honour.”<\/p>\n

Anniben, which means messy in Welsh, was a character Teifi began drawing when studying art at college.<\/p>\n

“It was like a weird, clowny character with kind of sunken eyes, and then a big red nose,” they said.<\/p>\n

“I thought \u2018you look kind of ill and sickly\u2019 and then it kind of clicked,” they said, adding it was “some sort of repressed trauma coming out”. <\/p>\n

Then one day Teifi decided to use make-up to transform themselves into Anniben. <\/p>\n

“I just realised that it was a really cool coping mechanism for me,” they said.<\/p>\n

“It’s really helped me a lot.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"LucyLucy Purrington<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Teifi identifies as “queer” and prefers the pronouns they\/ them<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Teifi, who describes androgynous Anniben as a “drag thing”, said their performances were conceptual and unlike the cabaret style performances typical of drag queens.<\/p>\n

“They’re gender fluid weirdness with a splash of camp, a splash of horror maybe and then just a lot of high energy and storytelling,” Teifi said. <\/p>\n

During one performance Anniben fell in love with a cake and in another, inspired by the fantasy film Pan’s Labyrinth, they had a “queer awakening” and became a monster with eyeballs in the palms of their hands.<\/p>\n

Teifi, who performs in both English and Welsh, said they felt “privileged” to be part of a small scene of Welsh-speaking drag acts in Cardiff.<\/p>\n

“It’s really lovely to see queerness and Welshness bridging,” they said. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"PhilPhil Jones Jeffreys<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

In one performance Anniben had a “queer awakening” and became a monster with eyeballs in the palms of their hands<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Performing as Anniben has also been a way for Teifi to explore their own gender identity.<\/p>\n

“The majority of my life I have been identifying as a gay male but in the past couple of years, and fairly recently, I’ve been questioning my own gender identity,” said Teifi.<\/p>\n

“I don’t think I’m a man but I don\u2019t think I\u2019m a woman either.<\/p>\n

“When I present myself as this kind of androgynous character, I feel really myself so I was like, \u2018why don’t I feel like that out of the makeup and stuff?'”<\/p>\n

Today Teifi identifies as “queer” and prefers the pronouns they\/ them.<\/p>\n

“As a blanket term queer suits me well because I don’t really know where I am on the spectrum,” they said. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"DafyddDafydd Owen (ffotoNant)<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

In March, Teifi, left, was discharged from their paediatric oncology clinic<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Teifi no longer has to see an oncologist but still lives with the legacy of cancer. <\/p>\n

On discharge they were advised to prioritise their health.<\/p>\n

“I don’t drink as much anymore, I don’t really stay out late, I’m eating better, so it\u2019s made me push myself healthily in a good way,” they said. <\/p>\n

Teifi said as a result of chemotherapy some of their teeth had not grown properly so they were hoping to get reconstructive dental surgery.<\/p>\n

The months since being discharged have been emotional. <\/p>\n

“It wasn\u2019t until fairly recently that I’ve understood more about what I went through, and it’s kind of been a bit traumatic to be honest,” said Teifi. <\/p>\n

“I remember being around other children who looked so poorly and a few of them passed away when I was there but I was so young I didn’t really understand what was going on at the time.”<\/p>\n

Teifi said the experience had giving them perspective. <\/p>\n

“Realising how close I was to not being here and how severe it was makes me immensely grateful that it was caught when it was and I’m still here today prancing around being a weirdo,” they laughed.<\/p>\n

“I have a nicer, richer outlook on life, taking everything as it is and pushing whatever I want to do, and doing it.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"ChloeChloe Michelle<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Teifi’s drag act is called Anniben, which means messy in Welsh<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Twm Rowley Teifi says their drag alter ego Anniben has been “a saviour for me” After enduring years of gruelling treatment for cancer as a child, Teifi Rowlands was left self-conscious about their appearance and uncomfortable in their own skin. But performing as drag alter ego Anniben has been a way of processing trauma and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6330,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[896,3873,2948,3872,3871,3870],"class_list":["post-6329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uk","tag-cancer","tag-childhood","tag-drag","tag-empowerment","tag-finding","tag-performer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6329"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6329\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6331,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6329\/revisions\/6331"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}