Wellington’s Devotion to the 90s club scene
AS THE 1990s took flight, house music had hypnotised the capital and the city was host to a plethora of warehouse raves and underground club nights, including the legendary gay pride Devotion parties.
The first Devotion party was held on December 7, 1991, with hundreds of revellers turning the Overseas Passenger Terminal on Wellington’s waterfront into an adrenaline-fuelled celebration of GLBTI (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex) culture.
The party went on to attract thousands and was often headlined by Wellington superstar DJ Clinton Smiley, aka Jason Harding.
It also drew legions of straight clubbers high on hedonism and united in their love of dance music.
In many ways, the festival embodied the optimism sparked by 1986’s Homosexual Law Reform Act, which legalised consensual sex between men aged over 16.
The act was introduced in 1985 by Labour MP Fran Wilde, who went on to open the Devotion parade with a speech as Wellington mayor 10 years later. But not everyone was a fan. In 1995, Evening Post assistant editor Karl du Fresne took umbrage at the festival’s alleged overthe-top flamboyance in a column titled ‘‘Here comes the annual look-at-me orgy’’.
‘‘The Devotion festival stops short of the provocative excesses of Auckland’s Hero parade (and doesn’t that self-adulatory name speak volumes?) or the in-yourface exhibitionism of Sydney’s gay mardi gras, both of which seem to delight in shocking and mocking conservative society.
‘‘What they seem to want now is special, preferential treatment. They lobby for special recognition in the workplace, propaganda sessions in schools, support groups and special funding.
‘‘And most of all they want public visibility, which brings us back to the Devotion festival – which, in the extremely unlikely event that you hadn’t heard of it, is a very public celebration of homosexuality,’’ du Fresne wrote.
Among the slew of letters to the editor responding to the column, it was probably one from Kelburn’s Ross Young that summed up the backlash most neatly.
‘‘Sir, Once a year Devotion allows lesbian and gay people in Wellington to celebrate their difference. It’s like a mini mardi gras in that for one day we try to turn things upside down. With 364 heterosexual days in the year, Karl du Fresne need not fear one gay day.’’
Partygoers were known as ‘‘Devotees’’ and in 1996 publicist Steve Attwood told The Dominion that year’s event – held at the newly-built Queen’s Wharf Events Centre – would be ‘‘exotic, decadent and fabulously rich’’.
The space in the centre was shrunk because it was too large, even for 3000 people.
‘‘The atmosphere is supposed to be crowded and close, with people dancing and bumping into each other,’’ Attwood said.
By 1998, another dance party was added to the festival’s summer roster.
‘‘Pan-global glamour is coming to Wellington, and the city’s gay community is fastening its seatbelt for the event of the year – Sprung at Devotion on February 14,’’ The Dominion reported.
‘‘Wellington’s Overseas Passenger Terminal and waterfront is being transformed into an international airport terminal with duty-free shop, transit lounges, air hostesses and a variety of dance spaces each with its own theme, and 12 of New Zealand’s bestknown DJs and live entertainment.’’
Between its inception in 1991 and its last hurrahs in the late 1990s, Devotion grew from a dance party to incorporate a parade, a week-long festival of arts, cultural and sporting events, and the publication of a magazine. The Dominion Post – 150 Years of News is available via dompost.co.nz or 0800 50 50 90. Priced at $34.95 + $3 postage and handling or $29.95 + $3 p&h for subscribers.