Why Does Ecdysiast History Matter?

The Ecdysiast Arts are often treated as spectacle, novelty, or something that should remain hidden. The history preserved inside our museum tells a much larger story.

For generations, women and gender-expansive performers used burlesque and stripping to earn income when other industries denied them access. They created their own stages, costumes, touring circuits, businesses, audiences, and professional identities.

Black, Indigenous, and other performers of color built careers despite segregation, racism, exclusion, and exploitation. Queer and transgender performers created spaces for self-expression, chosen family, safety, and cultural innovation. Disabled performers, immigrants, mothers, working-class artists, and survivors found ways to support themselves and one another outside systems that were never designed to welcome them.

These artists were more than entertainers. They were workers, designers, producers, organizers, businesspeople, and cultural strategists. They learned how to turn creativity into income and how to build community when society denied them traditional pathways to stability and liberation.

That history deserves the same care, scholarship, preservation, and public access afforded to any other major American cultural movement in the history of this country. 

That's why were are building one of the largest burlesque archives in the world right here in Davenport, IA.

Every(body) Wants to Be a Showgirl’s Toni Elling, Motor City’s ‘Satin Doll’, Exhibit at Ecdysiast Arts Museum in Davenport, ia.

The Perle Noire display at the Ecdysiast Arts museum in Davenport, IA.

In addition to honoring our late legends, we love to feature living icons.

These types of exhibits are especially important because it gives the artists the autonomy to tell their own stories how they want them told; while also offering a moment of reflection, education, and celebration to the community in a time and space where the performers can actually enjoy the 'flowers' they worked so hard for.

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Help Us Build a Permanent Home for Burlesque History and Community Care in Davenport

The Ecdysiast Arts Museum preserves the history of burlesque and stripping while creating a space where people can learn, perform, organize, eat, connect, and experience art that might otherwise never reach a working-class Midwestern community.

Today, nearly all of this work is being carried by a small team of 5 people.

We are raising an initial $150,000 to protect the museum’s archive, compensate the small team keeping the space running, continue food distribution and public programming, and build the administrative foundation needed to make the museum a permanent institution in Davenport. Once we reach that first goal, we will work toward a second goal of $300,000 so the museum can move from immediate stability into long-term growth.