“I think when you take the appropriation of profanity, it’s always reflexive of how the world around you relates to that word,” says Berlin-based director and photographer Matt Lambert on reclaiming language of oppression as a means of taking back power. “It’s a tool to elevate or evolve thinking within minority groups.” 

Lambert’s 2014 documentary-music video hybrid for Hercules & Love Affair’s “My Offence” saw members of New York’s ballroom scene dissecting their relationship with profanity – specifically, their reclamation of the C-word as a means of self- and shared empowerment. 

Julia Huxtable on Essence & Offence is the unedited version of an interview with DJ and artist Juliana Huxtable that features in "My Offence." Known for her wildly popular club nights and presence in the downtown art scene, Huxtable, who was the face of the New Museum’s 2015 Triennial, is an important voice regarding intersectionality, a term that refers to varied, overlapping systems of oppression regarding race, sexuality or gender identity.

Huxtable and the other stars of the original video, including performance artist Kalup Linzy and producer Honey Dijon, were shot in each of their bedrooms, lit heavily to highlight the regal nature of the larger-than-life characters. Shot early last year, before trans models and celebrities were gracing magazine covers and the Ferguson-sparked racial tensions across the US were yet to break, Huxtable’s comments take on a new poignancy.

“To me, in a lot of ways these are the people who are responsible for the evolution of humanity,” says Lambert, noting the ways in which the outlandish and outspoken figures pave the way for social progression. “Whether Caitlyn Jenner knows it or not, it takes Juliana and these kinds of kids to push ideas to the forefront, to make everyone comfortable to take those steps.”