All products featured on Allure are independently selected by our editors.
However, we may receive compensation from retailers and/or from purchases of products through links in this article.
Content note: This story contains a mention of suicide ideation.
Getty Images
Allure:Youve used makeup to transform into various characters throughout your career.
What are your earliest memories of playing with makeup?
Your mom’s makeup bag is such a magical place when you’re little.
Courtesy of MAC
[Makeup] affirmed how I felt on the inside when I was a child and a teenager.
I remember getting really into lipsticks when the nude lip waseverything.
I got really into setting spray; it sort of became my thing.
Getty Images
I always had it with me.
I would always spray it on myself every five minutes and at school breaks.
[Makeup] was just fun, like painting.
Then, later, I wore makeup all the time to let people know who I am.
I think all that’s really important and beautiful.
Allure: And now youre the star of MACs Viva Glam campaign, where makeup and LGBTQ+ activism converge.
Petras:I remember running to the MAC store when Nicki Minaj did Viva Glam.
That is constantly on my mood boards.
It’s really the perfect collaboration.
I said yes [to being in the campaign] in one second and I freaked out and cried.
I think right now, trans kids are the ones who are suffering from this whole ordeal the most.
It’s really hard to be a trans child.
I remember being tiny and having thoughts of killing myself.
You think the world thinks you’re crazy.
You think no one’s ever going to accept you.
What you need most of all is help figuring it out.
Allure: How much does the power of makeup manifest itself in your music?
Petras:Makeup and my songs and music are so intertwined with each other.
I get to tell my story [with makeup].
Telling stories is my favorite thing as a songwriter.
[My characters reference] things that are in my DNA as a person.
I didn’t really think, “I’m going to do hyper-feminine-bimbo-fication-core.”
I was just raised byParis Hilton.
Allure:What character do you plan on playing next?
Petras:In music, I have reached a really interesting point where I want to pull a one-eighty.
I don’t want to box myself in.
All I care about is creating things that I find beautiful.
But I’m onto a cool thing.
Old movies have been really influential to me.
I want to make something that’s half as beautiful as these movies.
Do you classify your own music as gay pop?
Gay clubs were the first places I snuck into because they were playing the music I was listening to.
I was so into Kylie Minogue and Madonna songs.
I was so into disco 70s music, like Donna Summer.
Even Judy Garland songs are, in ways, gay pop.
I think gay pop has always been there.
Nothing harmful has been done…
But I just hope it’s researched with people, the discourse.
Gay pop happened in history.
That’s the cool thing right now.
Being gay is cool, and that’s fucking everything and more.
But I don’t really need to claim anything.
Everything comes from hundreds of years of musicianship, so I just don’t feel the need to.
Allure:Before you go, tell me four products you cant live without.
Petras:TheMolecular Repair Hair Mask by K18.MAC Hyper Real Skin Canvas Balm.Tom Ford Lost CherryandTom Ford White Suede.
Their services are free and confidential.
More interviews with your favorite celebrities:
Now,Drag Racestars react to TikTok trends:
