09 Apr David Hoyle The Royal Vauxhall Tavern London 2010

David Hoyle is a bone fide genius. See his Wikepedia page for the full bio. This picture was taken during a seven week session of photographing backstage during the run of his show ‘Licking Wounds’ after I’d asked David if I could document the run of shows backstage. I took hundreds of images, David is very captivating and wonderful to photograph.
The first time I went to try and photograph him was in the early 90’s, I was too scared to ask. He was in the bar of an East End pub and just finished his set which I’d missed and he was walking around the pool table, chatting, still in his character Divine David and wearing a pink boucle Chanel suit. He was quite drunk and the Divine David  didn’t take prisoners. I thought he would tear into me and I feared public humiliation and I left rather lamely. That was probably 20 plus years ago.
David is now a friend. I genuinely think he is a genius.