Who is RuPaul’s husband, Georges LeBar? The low-key artist hails from Perth, Australia, met the Drag Race host on his 21st birthday, and loves spending time on his family’s ranch in Wyoming

Apr 24 , 2024

Visual artist Georges LeBar and his husband, Drag Race star RuPaul, at the 2019 Emmy Awards in Los Angeles, California. Photos: Getty Images

Behind drag icon RuPaul’s glitz and glam is a man who’s been the drag icon’s rock for three decades: Georges LeBar. A painter born in Perth, Australia, LeBar studied fashion and design in Paris, New York and Miami, according to his website.

Georges LeBar at the 2018 Time 100 Gala in New York City. Photo: Getty Images

LeBar has always seemingly been content with letting his husband take centre stage while avoiding the spotlight himself; LeBar has no public social media accounts and is rarely photographed.

Speaking to BuzzFeed in June 2015, RuPaul shared how LeBar’s humour and kindness won him over. “I remember praying, ‘I want a sweet, sensitive man,’ and I got an Australian who’s just lovely,” he added.

Here’s everything we know about Georges LeBar.

RuPaul met his husband at a New York nightclub

RuPaul and Georges LeBar attend the ceremony honouring RuPaul with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, in March 2018, in Hollywood, California. Photo: Getty Images

The first time LeBar, 51, and RuPaul, 63, crossed paths was in 1994, on the night of LeBar’s 21st birthday. The venue was Limelight, a legendary NYC nightclub that has since closed its doors. RuPaul recounted to ET in March 2017, “He was dancing like a crazed person. I went over and said, ‘What are you doing?’ You know, and that was that.”

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The difference in their heights – according to People, LeBar is an extremely tall 200cm (6ft 7) to RuPaul’s tall 193cm tall (6ft 4) – added an extra dimension to their physical attraction. “Can I put my arms around you?” RuPaul says he asked LeBar on meeting him, per a November 2019 interview with PinkNews. “Because I’m tall, I’ve never been able to put my arms around someone’s shoulders who was taller than me.”

George LeBar’s career in visual arts

Georges LeBar and RuPaul at the 2017 Time 100 Gala in New York City. Photo: Getty Images

LeBar’s twin passions – for oil painting and his husband – are united in “Sitting on a Secret”, a collection of four paintings showing RuPaul in bold drag attire.

Meanwhile, the artist’s 64-strong collection “Six Inches Away” depicts feminine figures at home, and outdoors in both rural and urban settings. LeBar has also published a book, Pillowtalk, in which he blends painting and poetry.

RuPaul and LeBar wed on their 23rd anniversary of meeting

RuPaul and Georges LeBar at the March 2018 ceremony honouring RuPaul with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Photo: Getty Images

In January 2017, on their 23rd anniversary of meeting – and LeBar’s birthday – RuPaul and his beau exchanged vows in a low-key ceremony at their California home.

“What’s happening politically right now, you know, you never know what could turn around at this point,” RuPaul told ET in March of that year – referring to Donald Trump’s surprise victory in the 2016 presidential election. “We thought, we don’t have to get married. But then, in light of what’s happening currently in the world today, what’s happening in Washington, we thought, you know what? Let’s just do it, because there’s too much at stake with our businesses. So that’s why we did it.”

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Georges LeBar owns a ranch in Wyoming

Per People, RuPaul and his husband divide their time between their mansion in Beverly Hills and LeBar’s 24,300-hectare ranch in Wyoming. According to The Guardian, LeBar inherited the property from his grandfather, who ran a sheep and cattle operation with his wife for decades there.

RuPaul told Hollywood Today Live in March 2017 that he finds Wyoming “very boring” and “the most isolated place on Earth”. As a result, LeBar spends more time on the ranch than his husband does – although RuPaul has fun dressing up like a cowboy when he visits. As the drag queen told US media in April 2019, “I usually wear fabulous Westernwear: denim concoctions, turquoise jewellery, gorgeous hats, Italian cowboy boots.”

RuPaul and LeBar have an open marriage

RuPaul and LeBar have always had an open relationship – something the drag superstar has been very candid about in interviews. “It’s just realistic,” RuPaul told The New Yorker in March, before adding controversially, “There’s no such thing as monogamy with men.”

Fame and celebrity

The Drag Race host and his husband have been in an open relationship for 3 decades – but it was Donald Trump’s election as US president that convinced them to tie the knot in 2017
LeBar’s oil paintings include portraits of his glamorous husband – who has called Wyoming ‘the most isolated place on Earth’ and likes to show up on the ranch in ‘fabulous Westernwear’