{"id":24689,"date":"2024-04-11T12:51:12","date_gmt":"2024-04-11T16:51:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=24689"},"modified":"2024-04-11T17:13:04","modified_gmt":"2024-04-11T21:13:04","slug":"as-the-world-burns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2024\/04\/11\/as-the-world-burns\/","title":{"rendered":"Rare Look Into Queer Boston From 1970s to \u201990s In Photo Exhibit \u2018As the World Burns\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Snapshots of the Boston bar Playland taken by bartender Jim McGrath and friends beginning in 1958 and \u201959 show a drag queen leaning on a jukebox under clouds of balloons, and men dressed up as monsters for what looks like a Halloween party, and men in grinning groups embracing as they pose in front of Christmas decorations. In scholar and activist Patricia A. Gozemba\u2019s black and white snapshots from a 1983 reunion of \u201cworking-class lesbians\u201d at Fran\u2019s Place in Lynn, women in suits and sweatshirts and permed hair smile and dance as couples or lean in together around tables full of drinks with cigarettes pinched between their fingers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These amazing personal snapshots come from The History Project<\/a>, an archive begun in 1980 to preserve New England LGBTQ+ histories, and are featured in the exhibition \u201cAs the World Burns: Queer Photography and Nightlife in Boston,\u201d<\/a> at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) at Tufts gallery, 230 the Fenway, Boston, from Jan. 24 to April 21, 2024. The one-room exhibit offers a striking window into parts of our community\u2019s history often overlooked by conventional tellers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs the World Burns\u201d showcases photography of queer life and liberation in Boston primarily from the 1970s to \u201890s\u2014as well as publications, video, ceramics, and textiles\u2014by Craig Bailey, Bobby Busnach, Nick DeWolf, Sherry Edwards, Avram Finkelstein, Allen Frame, Jason Byron Gavann, Nan Goldin, Patricia A. Gozemba, Jim McGrath, Philip Phlash, Angela Russo, Gail Thacker, Shellburne Thurber, Geraldine Visco, Christian Walker, and Mark Winer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Patricia
Patricia A. Gozemba, “Untitled [Fran\u2019s Place],” 1983, black and white photograph. (Courtesy of The History Project)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This was the period of Boston\u2019s Combahee River Collective<\/a> and their influential 1977 statement on Black feminism, lesbianism, and intersectionality: \u201cWe are actively committed to struggling against racial, sexual, heterosexual, and class oppression, and see as our particular task the development of integrated analysis and practice based upon the fact that the major systems of oppression are interlocking. \u2026 If Black women were free, it would mean that everyone else would have to be free since our freedom would necessitate the destruction of all the systems of oppression.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBoston was the most sophisticated place [in the 1970s and \u201880s] when it came to gay literature, gay activism, gay culture, gay criticism,\u201d says Jackson Davidow, who curated the exhibition. \u201cI think it had to do with the students and Boston being a university town that wasn\u2019t fully gentrified yet. I think it had a lot do with the counterculture of the \u201860s,\u201d as gay liberation movements build upon the preceding civil rights movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Christian
Christian Walker, “Self-portrait at 26 with White Boys,” published in “Amethyst: A Journal for Lesbians and Gay Men,” autumn 1988, p. 33. (Collection of the LGBTQ National History Archives)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Walker (1953\u20132003) is also the subject of a companion exhibition in the neighboring gallery, \u201cChristian Walker: The Profane and the Poignant.\u201d<\/a> The Springfield native moved to Boston in 1974 before relocating to Atlanta in the mid \u201880s. The Walker survey was originally organized by Davidow and Noam Parness for New York\u2019s Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art. Both shows appear here with assistance from Tufts University Art Galleries Curator Laurel V. McLaughlin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Davidow says the timeframe of \u201cAs the World Burns\u201d roughly corresponds to when Walker was in Boston, but also Davidow was \u201cwanting to think more about \u201870s and \u201880s gay life and sex culture before the onset of AIDS.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We see people finding friends and lovers and joy, people redefining themselves and forging their own communities at Boston area bars and nightclubs and pornographic movie theaters, sheltered from the virulent, violent homophobia of the dominant culture. There are furtive glimpses and people striking poses as well as unguarded smiles. \u201cThis was street family,\u201d Jason Byron Gavann told Davidow in 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jason
Jason Byron Gavann, “The Girls Giving Face, Cleavage, and Polyester,” 1977, photograph, RC color print, (Courtesy of the artist)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The photos come from the time before the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2003 that anti-sodomy laws used to target queer people were unconstitutional<\/a>. Only this January, did Massachusetts legislators begin the process to strike such laws from the books<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A 1973 photo by Allen Frame shows Nan Goldin photographing at Boston drag bar The Other Side. \u201cBeing at The Other Side was very empowering because it was our world,\u201d Bobby Busnach told Brian Halligan in a 2013 interview for The History Project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other photos document the Boston bar Together, the Boston lesbian bar The Saints, and Gay Liberation Front\u2019s dance parties at Boston\u2019s Charles Street Meeting House, where Gay Community News first operated. Photos by Gail Thacker and Philin Phlash document a 1980 fashion show at the Boston punk and new wave nightclub Spit\u2014\u201cfrom laboriously getting ready to go out to the aftermath of the evening\u2019s festivities: washing body paint off in the tub, exhausted, or lying in the arms of a lover,\u201d a gallery sign explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For many, these activities were \u201cvery undercover,\u201d as Craig Bailey says. \u201cI wanted some separation in my life. I wasn\u2019t, as they say now, bringing my whole self to work. \u2026 That\u2019s why there were so many bars. Because that\u2019s where people could go and feel safe. Now that we\u2019re more readily accepted in the general culture those bars have disappeared slowly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Allen
Allen Frame, “Nan photographing at The Other Side, Boston,” 1973. (Courtesy Gitterman Gallery \u00a9 Allen Frame)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs the World Burns\u201d looks at scrappy exuberant communities formed around local art schools\u2014the Museum School, Massachusetts College of Art and Design, New England School of Photography, Boston University. The exhibition digs into the photography published by the local gay press\u2014Gay Community News, Fag Rag, Boston Gay Review, Bad Attitude. \u201cThe press was really significant for visualizing what lesbian and gay life looked like in the \u201870s and \u201880s,\u201d Davidow says. And the exhibition highlights festive, personal snapshots that, Davidow says, are \u201cmuch more about preserving the immediacy of moments and documenting spaces.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was a danger inherent in being seen in these photos as the dominant culture threatened queer folks then\u2014and now. \u201cI do think there\u2019s a tension between the desire to protect people and the desire to make public these amazing people and amazing experiences,\u201d Davidow says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Walker photographed in the Combat Zone, Boston\u2019s red light district of strip clubs, burlesque bars and porno movie houses. In 1982, he also recorded friends in Fort Hill Faggots for Freedom, \u201ca radical living collective of more than 20 gay people\u201d in Boston\u2019s Roxbury neighborhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The grainy, almost spectral photos of Walker\u2019s 1983-84 \u201cThe Theater Project\u201d survey the Pilgrim Theater, including \u201cbathrooms where men and trans people cruise and hook up,\u201d according to a gallery sign. Located in the Combat Zone, the theater screened straight porn, but \u201cattracted audiences overwhelmingly in search of homosexual encounters\u2014even if many of these men were closeted in the straight world and did not identify as gay.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When some of these photos were published in Fag Rag in 1983, Boston Licensing Commissioner Joanne Prevost Anzalone got a copy and used it as evidence of \u201ckinky gays\u201d to shut the theater down for some days, Davidow says. Walker told Gay Community News at the time: \u201cIt\u2019s a very outrageous situation that a document, a piece of art, is used as a way of harassing men. . . . There\u2019s a strong historical basis for sex going on in theaters in Boston\u2014it\u2019s been going on for 40 years.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Christian
Christian Walker, from “The Theater Project,” 1983-4, gelatin silver print. (Collection of David VanHoy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The 1980s were also the dawn of the AIDS epidemic, and touring the exhibition, it can be hard not to feel haunted by all the lives lost\u2014including Polaroid photographer and Super 8 filmmaker Mark Morrisroe, who is depicted here in the photos of that 1980 fashion show at Spit, and died of AIDS in 1989 at age 30.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Craig Bailey moved to the Boston suburbs in 1982 when he was hired as a customer service rep for an auto manufacturer. After a buyout in 1989, he moved to Somerville then Boston, and took a photography class at the Boston Center for Adult Education that proved to be a launching pad. He photographed events, freelanced for newspapers, and found part-time community outreach work, especially around AIDS prevention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\""Color
“Color Me Healthy: Safer Sex Guide for Gay Men” brochure by Craig Hickman with photos by Craig Bailey for Fenway Community Health Center, 1994. (Collection of Craig Bailey)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In the 1990s, as the AIDS pandemic entered its second decade, people rethought safe sex education\u2014experimenting with sexy how-tos that also tried to reach more diverse audiences. An example is the explicit sexy photography in the brochure \u201cColor Me Healthy: Safer Sex Guide for Gay Men,\u201d which was published by the Fenway Community Health Center in 1994. It was conceived by Craig Hickman, now a Maine state senator, to reach people of color. Bailey, who took the brochure\u2019s photos, says, “The idea was, ‘Look, if you\u2019re trying to tell people something, you need to speak plainly and directly,’ and that was what that brochure was trying to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCraig Hickman pulled all of that together. We shot it in my living room,\u201d Bailey recalls. He developed the photos himself at the Boston Photo Co-op in Jamaica Plain. \u201cThat was the first roll of film I developed because I didn\u2019t want to hand it to someone else and say, \u2018Can you develop this for me?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bailey also photographed theatrical productions and made publicity photos for The Theater Offensive, an LGBTQ+ company, and other theater troupes. \u201cI entered into what I believe to be a cultural renaissance in terms of the gay Black community in Boston,\u201d Bailey says. \u201cSo many of the people I knew, friends in community, were bringing everything they had to the table in so many ways, all the creativity they had.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Related:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Craig Bailey\u2019s \u2018Faces of AIDS\u2019 Photographs Of \u2018My Friends That I Lost’<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 \u2018Eulogy For The Dyke Bar\u2019 Ponders The \u2018Mass Closing\u2019 Of Lesbian Bars<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

If this is the kind of coverage of arts, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, occasional newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting. (All content \u00a9Greg Cook 2024 or the respective creato<\/em>rs.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\u201cAs
\u201cAs the World Burns: Queer Photography and Nightlife in Boston” at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) at Tufts University Art Galleries, 2024. (Photography by Mel Taing.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Allen
Allen Frame, “Kevin in polka-dotted dress,” Cambridge \n1974, gelatin silver print. (Courtesy Gitterman Gallery \u00a9 Allen Frame)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Mark
Mark Winer, “As the World Burns,” 1973, digitized Super 8 film, 18 min. (Courtesy of the artist)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Patricia
Patricia A. Gozemba, “Untitled [Fran\u2019s Place],” 1983, black and white photograph. (Courtesy of The History Project)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Angela
Angela Russo, “GCN Benefit at Club Max,” 1978, photograph. (Courtesy of Northeastern University Library)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Nick
Nick DeWolf, “Young Men Hanging a Poster for Gay Liberation Dance at Charles Street Meeting House,” 1970, photograph. (Courtesy of the Nick DeWolf Foundation Photo Archive)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Jim
Jim McGrath and others, “Untitled [Playland],” 1950s to 1980s, photographs. (Collection of The History Project)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\u201cChristian
\u201cChristian Walker: The Profane and the Poignant” at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) at Tufts.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Christian
Christian Walker, “Untitled (Matt and Lester),” 1982, gelatin silver print. (Collection of Lester Stockman)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Christian
Christian Walker, “Untitled (Boston\u2019s Combat Zone),” c. 1979-83, gelatin silver print. (Collection of David VanHoy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Snapshots of the Boston bar Playland taken by bartender Jim McGrath and friends beginning in 1958 and \u201959 show a drag queen leaning on a jukebox under clouds of balloons, and men dressed up as monsters for what looks like a Halloween party, and men in grinning groups embracing as they pose in front of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24688,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[1245],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24689"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24689"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24689\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24737,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24689\/revisions\/24737"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}