How gay artists exprsed forbidn sire | CNN

Contents:

• HIDN PLA SIGHT: HOW GAY ARTISTS EXPRSED FORBIDN SIRE
• DICK LESCH’S GUI TO SEVENTI GAY SLANG
• GAY SLANG 101
• 12 SLANG WORDS FOR GAY – USE THE TERMS TO ADDRS THEM!

HIDN PLA SIGHT: HOW GAY ARTISTS EXPRSED FORBIDN SIRE

Bgraphi and analysis of work by Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgenr+ intified artists, or works associated wh LGBT+ topics. From gay paters like Leonardo da Vci and Andy Warhol to bisexuals like Frida Kahlo and trans artists like Lili Elbe and Jefey Cathere Jon, the rabow of great LGBTQ+ paters stretch around the world. It’s jarrg to thk that was only 50 years ago that male homosexualy was crimalized the UK.

Prr to 1967, hidg one’s sexualy was not jt a choice for gay men, but a necsy. Known gay men like Osr Wil (who was later imprisoned bee of his sexualy) married women for social pretense, and psychiatrists offered dangero nversn therapi to those sperate to alter their orientatn.

Polari, a secret Brish slang ed by gay men, for stance, allowed them to speak eely whout the fear of arrt. Gay artists (as well as artists believed to be gay) often explored homosexualy amic guis, such as through Greek mythology.

DICK LESCH’S GUI TO SEVENTI GAY SLANG

1869) for example, hted at the sexual relatns between olr mentors and young men Ancient Greece, wh the sexual subtext of an terracial gay uple.

Gay rights: Greatly expand, 'impossibly agile'.

Props like peack feathers and dyed green rnatns were worn on jacket lapels, athetic signifiers that allowed gay men to intify themselv – and each other – whout beg ught. As a gay man himself, Warhol was offerg a space for queer dienc wh the homophobic language of mastream Ameri. His work manipulat spac tradnally associated wh heterosexualy, like locker rooms, wh a queer athetic, ntug Warhol’s tradn of transformg the everyday to artistic s of gay male sire.

GAY SLANG 101

Dick Lesch, an early gay-rights activist, who is now his eighti, arranged to donate his old workg fil to the archiv of the New York Public Library. ”In 1959, when Lesch was twenty-four, he left his fay home, Kentucky, for New York Cy, where he found work as a pater, a bartenr, a rator, a journalist, and as the unpaid print of the Mattache Society, one of the first gay-rights anizatns.

When the Stonewall rts broke out, three years later, he was the only openly gay reporter on the scene, verg the event for a new gay-focsed magaze lled The a recent Friday eveng, Lesch’s buzzer rang. In 1959, he left Kentucky for New York Cy, where he beme the print of the Mattache Society, one of the first gay-rights anizatns. A py of a 1976 gay guibook, wrten by Lesch, along wh his origal typewrten mancript.

“This rd file is great, ” he said, flippg through a set of four-by-six x rds on which Lesch had neatly typed out gay slang terms om antiquy. ” Some of the fns were more nuanced: an “ntie, ” Lesch had wrten, was “an ageg or middle aged homosexual, offtim effemate character, ” or “a person of settled meanor who utns agast temperate acts. Lesch ed to llect mentns of the “homophile movement, ” a term that preced the morn gay-rights vobulary.

12 SLANG WORDS FOR GAY – USE THE TERMS TO ADDRS THEM!

Lesch holds up a plastic toy school b, ma the neteen-sixti by the Gay Toy Company. Photograph by Rebec FudalaNext up was Lesch’s llectn of magaz and newsletters, cludg After Dark (“Oh, bls you—they’re real llector’s ems, ” Bmann said); Christopher Street (“We have the archiv”); Female Mimics (“That’s fabulo”); the 1969 Time issue on homosexualy (“Cute”); and the monthly bullet for the Mattache Society.

A 1971 issue of Gay featured an terview that Lesch had nducted wh a twenty-five-year-old Bette Midler. Many untri around the world have their own versn of queer slang, om Brish gay slang rived om the rhymg slang Polari to beki – the Philipp’ queer language that borrows om a slew of sourc, cludg pop culture, Japane, Spanish, and the untry’s lol languag.