Clubber Spotlight: Juan Duarte
Brazilian singer, stylist, director and Dazed 100 winner Juan Duarte reconciles queerness, rural memory, and pop excess – here he tells us the story behind his latest music video 'Máquina Latina'
"I’m a Brazilian singer, stylist, and director whose work blurs queerness, rural memory, and pop excess, clashing performance, vulnerability, and cultural reinvention. I’ve always been drawn to the stage. I started out belting gospel in church as a kid, my first weekly spotlight. Later came a reggae band, some pop rock drama, electronic noise… I studied performing arts, and from there, music and live performance became inseparable in everything I did.
"This project wrestles with masculinity through the lens of where I come from. The Brazilian countryside can be a rough terrain for queer joy, so I wrote these songs like arrows, aimed at a fragile, luminous, and untouchable desire.
"We wanted a track for the dancefloor – fun, raw, a little sexy, and not too serious. I wrote it with producer Viviane Mendes in 2023, then I showed it to BoyPrincess, the director of the film, who immediately sparked with ideas. He started dreaming up a whole visual world with me. The video was shot entirely in my hometown, Catalão, where BoyPrincess and a beautiful crew came to meet my family, childhood friends, and local artists. That’s where we found Teresinha do Primavera — a 76-year-old former radio actress with the lifelong dream of stardom, both on and off camera. She became the heart of the film.
"My creative circle is made of my friends — artists I’ve been building with over the past five years. Together, we build bridges between different visions of Brazil and beyond. I just threw two release parties — one in São Paulo, one in Catalão — and now I’m flying to Europe for my first Eurotour, from June 13 to the end of July. Dates already confirmed in Paris and Berlin, and I’m ready to bring the heat for more places. Can’t wait."
Máquina Latina by Juan Duarte
Directed by Boy Princess
Starring Teresinha do Primavera
Stage Direction by Martha Kiss Perrone
Cinematography by João Rubio
Music Production by Viviane Mendes
Companies
Dazed Media
- Publishing