Hey everybody, I'm Tete Kupula, people will thank before we get started, um, J.B.T. of course for this wonderful evening.
And um, Del Burisco, my dear friend and confidant, thank you so much.
And also a big, big thanks to my roommate and constant friend and confidant, also, um, Alberto, we're really good.
We continue to style this entire show, so thank you.
Um, I'd like to share a little bit of what Keon, the brand, means to me.
That's spelled with Q-I-A-M, by the way.
So, Keon is elegant, simple, sexy, and fierce.
It is unisex and gender-vivalent.
It's an expression of queer identity and a way to take up space.
It's handmade to honor individual bodies and experiences.
Keon is an alternative to fast fashion outlets and an effort to support the industry,
which is inherently capitalistic, colonialist, binary based,
and often comes at the expense of underpaying and exploiting workers all over Asia.
Keon is also dedicated to the unnamed seamstress in the Philippines who raised me from ages one through five while my biological mother,
worked at the Nerf Society of Radio.
And it's a way to take back the basic need to be clothed and imbued with intentionality.
It's a project powered by community interest, support, and love.
It is funded in part by the Chances Dance's Mark Engelhard Memorial Grand.
Fantastic. It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me, and for you.
It is a gift to me, by me.
