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Travel Advisory:
Virgil Thomson posed the riddle “What have Paris and Kansas City in common?” The answer was corruption and good food. What has the Galerie Au Bonheur du Jour in Paris in common with the Leslie-Lohman Gay Art Foundation in New York City? The answer is fabulous rare gay erotica. It was truly a day of bonheur when I threaded my way through a maze of treets looking for the little gallery. It is located in the historic deuxième arrondissement on the corner of rue Chabanais and rue Cherubini, in an area famous for its former maisons closes (brothels). Last December, when I visited, the exhibition was of “physique” photographs of Jean Ferrero, from 1950-1965. Chaqu’un á son goût, but a beefy man basted in mineral oil staring at his pumpkin shaped bicep is not my tasse de thé. Je ne suis pas un cannibale. Mme. Nicole Canet is a petite, elegant (black dress, of course), very cool lady, a model of propriety who is used to a lot of hassle from anti-erotic crazies of all stripes. Her beautiful posters are torn down by irate citoyens. Curiously, the one unmolested poster featured a Lehnert & Landrock photo of a beardless youth in a turban. Mme. Canet was with a client (his rain-coat collar discreetly turned up) and she regarded me with cool appraisal. Having noted my indifference to the hunky photographs, I think she decided I was from Interpol vice squad. However, color must have animated my cheeks, giving me away, as I found some of her delicious publications on the counter, including Les amants de Sidi Bou Saïd: Univers intime masculin d’un photographe amateur anonyme en 1945. This fascinating volume is an example of gay history salvaged (the negatives were destroyed). Sidi Bou Saïd was a North African spot popular with intellectuals and film directors. We can see why in these snapshots by an anonymous amateur who documented his tricks in their full tumescence, in his bedroom and on the beach, creating a visual diary of erotic bonheur du jour. Charles Leslie had given me the announcement card for this book, which is why I was there. Mme. Canet then tested me further by indicating a portfolio of various artists’ work, and said she would be with me soon. In the meantime, I was invited to have a look in a small adjoining room, the inner sanctum. I found myself in an Ali Baba’s treasure cave, or rather Mme. Canet’s treasure room. It was crowded with painting, sculpture, objets of all sorts, absolutely fabulous! There were wonderful paintings by artists I never heard of and by major artists we rarely ever can see, for examples Gaston Goor and Jean Boullet. The French author Roger Peyrefitte had formed a great collection of gay erotica, and here were items from his collection: ancient Asian godemichés (tell U.S. Customs they are prosthetic devices for erectile disorders) to a sculpture formed from a wicked, braided leather whip. Ga-ga from this culture shock, Mme. Canet had to help me back to a table en plein air in the main room. Doubts dispelled, she assumed her real persona as surely the première dealer in the world of gay erotica. She brought out marvel after marvel, perceptively noting my reaction as Bernard Berenson and Lord Duveen would have done, honing in on a client’s particular sensibilities, as did the late Frank Thompson in his little treasury in Greenwich Village. She kept temptation mounting. When she showed me Vingt lithographies pour un livre que j’ai lu, I capitulated. This portfolio, published anonymously in Paris in 1945, is based on writing by Jean Genet with 20 exquisite illustrations by Roland Caillaud. These illicit drawings have been circulated underground in photographs ever since (see Thomas Waugh’s Out/Lines). It is worth a trip to Paris to meet Mme. Canet and her gallery. Her last exhibit was Beautes exotiques: photographies anciennes et modernes. The impossible dream to buy Contact Mme. Nicole Canet, Galerie Au Bonheur du Jour, 11 rue Chabanais, 75002 Paris. Tel: 01 42 96 58 64. www.curiositel.com/aubonheurdujour.
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Bravery Under Fire—A Book Review Self-Confidence and Persistence:
Two Hundred Years of History. Resistance by Germans to religious-medical-political homophobia has been perhaps stronger and more organized than any other country, and such resistance has nowhere been more brutally attacked. In the 1920s, Berlin was the gay capital of the world, but when the Nazis came to power the
gay and lesbian sub-culture, with its libraries and institutions, its bars and publishing houses, was crushed through mass arrests, torture, and murder. As War II’s end did not bring liberation. As can be seen on official U.S. Army film, an American Army officer evacuating a concentration camp would not allow a starving gay man to leave the camp, because “he is a criminal.” After the war, all victims of Nazi persecution except homosexuals were awarded various compensation and pensions. No mention of gay victims was allowed in Berlin’s huge new Holocaust Memorial. East Germany reinstated the old pre-Nazi Code 175, criminalizing homosexual contact, but West Germany under the rule of the Christian Democrats retained the even more repressive Nazi version. Finally, in 1968, East Germany amended the law while in 1969 West Germany amended the Nazi version to allow sexual acts between consenting people over the age of 21. Unified Germany’s new laws now have set the age of consent (Hello America) at sixteen years of age. On the occasion of the expansion and installation of a permanent exhibition at the Schwules (Gay) Museum in Berlin, its director Dr. Andreas Sternweiler has written Self-Confidence and Persistence: Two Hundred Years of History. Dr. Sternweiler presents with succinct exactitude an account of the two centuries of struggle and of the leaders, one should say heroes, who persevered against the life-threatening odds. Karl-Heinz Steinle helped to compile and adapt the wealth of material. Like all the Museum’s distinguished publications, this book is beautifully produced. Its graphic design was by Detlev Pusch, who also designed Patrick Angus: Los Angeles Drawings, a co-publication of the Schwules Museum and the Leslie/Lohman Gay Art Foundation. Self-Confidence and Persistence’s illustrations, taken from work in the Museum’s collections, are fascinating in themselves. They range from a Flemish ivory relief, ca 1620, portraying Poseidon and his lover Pelops, to vintage photographs of affectionate couples, to a Gestapo document which just to look at sends a wave of nausea and terror in empathy with the poor man who received it. Dr. Sternweiler does not dwell on the horrors. He celebrates the “self confidence and persistence” of the men who dared to live their true lives. The book’s cover illustration is an early “lure of the Mediterranean” painting, an enticement to visit southern Italy, addressed to gay tourists. In the Blue Grotto of Capri, painted ca 1837 by Ferdinand Flohr, reveals a homoerotic paradise (pre-von Gloeden) and celebrates the abundance and availability of southern Italian high-testosterone youth. The Schwules Museum is raising money to purchase this important icon and would welcome any donation. Patrick Angus: Los Angeles Drawings may be ordered from the Leslie/Lohman Gay Art Foundation. Self Confidence and Persistence may be ordered from the Schwules Museum, Mehringdamm 61, 10961 Berlin. www.schwulesmuseum.de. |
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Comments? Questions? Requests? E-mail us: The Leslie-Lohman Gay Art Foundation