Why gay-iendly Taiwan is a creative haven for LGBTQ art | CNN

Contents:

• WHAT TOOK TO CREATE THE WORLD’S FIRST GAY ART MM
• THE GAY FIGURE ARTISTS ARE REIMAGG THE MALE GAZE
• HIDN PLA SIGHT: HOW GAY ARTISTS EXPRSED FORBIDN SIRE
• WHY GAY-IENDLY TAIWAN IS A CREATIVE HAVEN FOR LGBTQ ART

WHAT TOOK TO CREATE THE WORLD’S FIRST GAY ART MM

The "Queer Threads" exhibn, which ran early 2014, examed the diversy of gay, lbian, bisexual, transgenr, and queer experienc.

From the stage of the Founrs’ Day celebratn of the Llie + Lohman Mm of Gay and Lbian Art, the octogenarian art llector addrsed the r crowd there to celebrate the upg expansn of the mm he tablished– a major tone that will double size the world’s first and only mm dited to gay art. But before discsg the future, Llie wanted to talk about the origs of his llectn of homoerotic work.

THE GAY FIGURE ARTISTS ARE REIMAGG THE MALE GAZE

The rt, ed, was history: thoands of years of lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr history, ignored and relegated to circumscribed footnot, if that. Or as the print of the mm’s board of directors, art historian Jonathan David Katz, puts , Llie “enpsulat the cultural tennci” of more than half a century of gay historic activism. Growg up a small town durg the Deprsn, Llie’s exposure to gayns as an inty was limed to what he uld glean om the encyclopedia.

Aware of his own sexual sir om an early age, he left for Los Angel as soon as he uld, where he easily fell wh s sub rosa gay muny.

But was Europe that ma him realize there was such a thg as “gay history” – and that much of that history was only prerved art. “We ma the disvery early on that we'd both been discreet llectors of gay imagery, ” Llie says. His rourc, bed wh Llie’s nnectns to the theater and art worlds, enabled them to amass a trove of gay art.

HIDN PLA SIGHT: HOW GAY ARTISTS EXPRSED FORBIDN SIRE

“Charl [Llie] has always been fundamentally foced on the homoerotic, which he unrstands as the most dissint form of art makg, ” says Katz, “bee by fn has been historilly exclud.

Do that leave “gay art” the same nebulo I-know--when-I-see- tegory as pornography or obsceny? Neverthels, the time durg which Llie was first llectg, the vast majory of gay work was ma by gay artists. As he tells , three thgs happened the summer of 1969: Woodstock, the Stonewall Rebelln, and his first annual Exhibn of Homoerotic Art, which he held his Soho stud.

Their hope was to sell explicly gay work (as opposed to work by gay artists tryg to mask their sexualy or create art for a straight dience), orr to prove “wasn’t potls to make.

WHY GAY-IENDLY TAIWAN IS A CREATIVE HAVEN FOR LGBTQ ART

After the third such Exhibn 1972, they opened their first official gay art venture, The Llie Lohman Gallery on Broome Street.

There, they ntued to show homoerotic art (one early show troduced New York to the leather daddy athetic of Tom of Fland), but also branched out to clu work by women (such as Marn Pto’s solo exhib “Man as a Sex Object”), and ls openly erotic work. But the ial foc on gay men, and particular, whe gay men, ntued the unfortunate tradn of excludg women and people of lor om the historil rerd. But the early ’80s would see the bs – and nearly the entirety of gay life Ameri – subsumed by the AIDS crisis.

Many of their artists and ctomers died, while others refoced their energy on rg for the sick and fightg homophobic fai, apathetic ernment anizatns and rporatns that saw the gay muny as too small a market to make profable to explore new dgs. They had to close the gallery 1983, but ntued to promote gay art by playg yenta to an rmal work of artists and llectors. So stead, they opened the Llie/Lohman Gay Art Foundatn, a non-prof dited to showg and prervg LGBT art.