I’ve enjoyed the lively -- at times too lively -- debate on our listserve about the future of a queer presence in the world of art, art history, and criticism. It’s exciting to be in on the continuing evolution of our sense of LGBTQ identity, creativity, and social goals, wherever it might lead us.
All the same, in common with many Caucus members old enough to remember Stonewall, or even the East Village ’80s, I feel wistful about the fading of the plucky, radically political, and collectively-oriented “movement” of the first two decades after Stonewall. That movement gave birth to this Caucus exactly twenty years into the modern gay world, in 1989. Its inception, by Jonathan David Katz and others, at the CAA meeting in -- where else? -- San Francisco, attracted, if I recall correctly, a spillover crowd of some 60 dykes and faggots excited to finally be gaining a toehold in CAA, among the last of the major professional associations to acknowledge our presence and address gay culture openly and objectively. So little was then known, or publicly available, about gay/lesbian presence in the visual arts that our first big project, the Bibliography of Gay and Lesbian Art, though containing barely 1,200 items, sold well enough to support the Caucus for five years after its 1994 publication. How much we’ve accomplished overall will be decided by future historians, but I’m amazed and heartened to find that the second edition of our bibliography, nearing completion by Ray Anne Lockard, now counts items in the tens of thousands.
We’re in; we’re more or less a part of the mainstream discourse on art and sexuality. There are lots of us, and we’re busy at our work -- painting, writing, researching -- with far less prejudice or censorship than I could have imagined when I came out in the early 1970s. In our successes, we’ve greatly alleviated the age-old pains of enforced secrecy and ignorance, and negative stereotypes that Stonewall sought to overcome. That’s the good side. On the other hand, the economic security that fertilized ’60s radicalism has faded into the uncertainties of the global, wired world, which has seismically changed our forms of image-making and cultural communication, while the optimistic spirit of social justice and scientific improvement has been aggressively supplanted by resurgent conservative religiosity and faith-based (or just loony) government policies that censor and demean queer citizens while they shrink everyone’s social and cultural opportunities, along with the economy, the social safety net, and our nation’s reputation as a culture whose creative products are internationally desirable.
No wonder so many among us are unsure of where to go, what to do, that some are skeptical about the visibility of identity-based organizations, and/or unsure what involvement with CAA as a whole means in an era of educational and arts cutbacks. No wonder we all feel tired of business as usual, or just plain tired. It’s a new world out there in the near-two decades since 1989: its ugliness is not so much esthetic as moral, its pressing issues not so much sexual and gender (though we remain a favored target of the right) as political, religious, scientific, and economic in ways that cut across gay and straight, artist and burger-flipper.
As to which way we should, or can, turn at our current fork in the road, I look forward to that discussion, however it turns out, at our extended business meeting-cum-reception. We’ve arranged a special three-hour gathering early Thursday evening to decide on our future direction. Coffee, tea, soft drinks and really big cookies will be served, so come at 5:30 and have dinner after. Please attend that meeting if you possibly can; all opinions and suggestions are welcome, as long as they are expressed calmly and stick to ideas and issues, not personalities.
If you’re coming to CAA, rest up beforehand: besides Thursday’s community meeting, there will be important and exciting Caucus events from the first to the last day of the new four-day schedule. Our major session on classical antiquity, chaired by Peter Holliday, is scheduled for opening day (now Wednesday), so please arrive as early as you can. And stick around -- Chris Reed’s short session on homophobia will close out the conference on Saturday at lunchtime.
My deepest thanks to the officers of the Caucus, present and past, and to all of you who have made it both a privilege and a pleasure to serve the organization. If it’s still around after my term is up, I’ll still be active somehow.
Fondly,
Jim
james.saslow@qc.cuny.edu
The Queer Caucus for Art is cosponsoring “Queer Eye,” a juried exhibition that is running concurrently with the CAA conference at the Harbor Gallery of University of Massachusetts, Boston. All Caucus members and friends who will be in Boston are invited to a special reception that will be held at the Gallery on Friday evening, February 24, from 5:30 to 7 pm. We urge all of you to attend.
The student-run Harbor Gallery is located in McCormack Hall on the UMass campus, 100 Morrissey Boulevard in the South Boston neighborhood. The campus is accessible by the MTA Red Line subway to JFK/UMass station and campus shuttle bus, or by a short taxi ride from the conference hotel area. Detailed maps and directions will be available at Caucus events and panels.
The juried exhibition, which runs from January 23 to February 26, presents work by 25 nationwide artists of various sexual persuasions or identity who are creating queer art. According to exhibit co-organizer David Areford, who teaches in the UMass-Boston art department, this contested category means, for the purposes of this show, art that critically engages issues of gender, sex, sexual orientation, or the body, whether as cultural constructions or as essential bodily and psychological experiences. With a special focus on works that examine sexuality in relation to politics, identity, or metaphor, the exhibition aims to address such questions as: How is queerness visually expressed? Does it have characteristic forms and strategies? What constitutes queer subject matter? Are the goals of feminism, lesbian/gay studies, and queer theory still relevant to artists, or have we entered a new phase more properly called post-gay or neo-queer? In short, is there a queer way of seeing, and what is queer art today?
College Art Association in Boston
22-25 February 2006
You can view the scheduled speakers for all 196 panels at collegeart.org. Those sessions below seem to be of particular interest to this audience.
Caucus-sponsored panel: “Classical antiquity and the expression of queer desires” (chaired by Peter Holliday)
Wednesday, Feb. 22, 2:30-5 pm
Other papers by caucus members:
“Angel spittle and ejected vision of the periphery latina/o writers: photo stories or off-frame(d) photography” by Camera Query (Maria de Guzmán) - on “Scenes beyond the picture” panel, Friday
Other panels:
“Cleaning house: rethinking gender and domestic space in early modern Europe” (Thursday, 12:30-2 pm)
In Boston when we’re there: “Methods” at Emmanuel College, including David Brown (see members item)
A survey on “Who we are and where we’re going” and the state of the discipline was sent to the QUEERART list at the end of 2005, and resent after the holidays. The results will be compiled before the business meeting in Boston. If you have not completed the survey, please do. The survey can be found on the caucus webpage at artcataloging.net/glc/glcn.html -- or in the list archive. If you would rather have the Word version emailed or mailed to you, please send your address to Sherman Clarke (address to the left).
Our current balance -- prior to the expense of this newsletter -- is $1,145.57. With newsletter expenses and the upcoming CAA business meeting and reception, this is a rather minimal amount so we really do need your renewals.
Please feel free to contact me with your questions or membership corrections.
Susan Aberth
Treasurer
Assistant Professor, Bard College
P.O. Box 518
Tivoli, NY 12583
aberth@bard.edu