One of the major purposes for the existence of the Leslie-Lohman Gay Art Foundation is to preserve and protect gay art through the creation and maintenance of the George Dudley Archive. An archive was established at the inception of the Foundation and has been named in memoriam after the Foundation's first director, George Dudley. The George Dudley Archive, of course, was in development for many years before the formation of the Foundation. Fritz Lohman and Charles Leslie have been collecting and preserving gay art since the beginning of their relationship of love — not only for each other — but for the art that has informed their lives. The George Dudley Archive represents one of the gay world's greatest treasures of artists' estates and works by living artists: collections of Blade, Delmas Howe, Arthur Tress, Duncan Grant, Keith Haring, REX, Peter Flinch, Ira Smith, Patrick Angus, Joe Radoccia, Gail S. Goodman...to mention a few.

To enhance the awareness and appreciation of the George Dudley Archive, each edition of The Archive (the Journal of the Leslie-lohman Gay Art Foundation) will spotlight an important artist whose contributions to gay art — and ultimately to gay freedom -- is worthy of our attention and appreciation. This edition of The Archive proudly presents the world of...Blade. A fitting artist for the inception of the Artist's Forum. And fitting too that words about Blade are shared by friends and admirers, Charles Leslie and Gene Tunesi.

________________________________________

NEEL "BLADE" BATE
By Charles Leslie

A Note on Neel Bate and Dirty Pictures

Born during World War I, Mr. Bate grew up in Seattle, Washington, where he had begun to draw even before school age. In grade school he began to draw his young peers into his (as well as their own) sexual fantasies. It seemed completely natural to him to picture all the discoveries he and his friends were making about themselves and about each other...as natural to Neel, in fact, as making the discoveries. He eventually won a scholarship to study under Mark Tobey, then later, another to the celebrated Cornish School where music, dance and drama were required as part of the art course. Martha Graham was the dance teacher and Neel's first stage set was almost as much of a thrill to him as his first academic life class. The double disaster of the Great Depression and a family crisis made dropping out of art school a necessity. Jobs were desperately scarce so Neel hitchhiked to California, where, amazingly, he found work requiring his drawing talent. Night school classes became a habit. During World War II, the artist served with the wartime Merchant Marine (an experience that inspired a substantial output of erotic drawings) and, in 1945, he moved to New York City, where he made his home.

The reproductions of the DIRTY PICTURES date back to 1947. Others pre-dating these images were unfortunately destroyed during the early 40s.

The series entitled, THE BARN, 1947/48 (in a separate album) was spread through the country and beyond when the only photocopies of it were confiscated by the New York City Police Department in the arrest of a man (during a raid on his apartment) who had hoped to sell them. Such raids on the homes of gay man were a commonplace of the period.

New york City's "Finest" apparently knew a good thing when they saw it — because soon after the pictures had been carted off to the police depository, photo-sets of the twelve images started doing a brisk, underground business on the streets of New York. From there on, traffic in the pictures burgeoned and over the years small fortunes changed hands. Endless re-photographing of 3rd, 4th and 5th generation prints resulted in ever-fuzzier images but the trade nevertheless persisted energetically well into the 1960s. Mr. Bate, of course, never realized a penny from the voluminous traffic in his erotic visions. He could not exactly complain to the police. The artist did not, however, lose the images entirely. His good friend George Platt Lynes had painstakingly recorded all of Neel's drawings before various disasters befell them. It is these Platt Lynes negatives that are the basis for the superb reproductions of Mr. Bate's work in the book, The Barn, 1948, and other Dirty Pictures by Blade.

In 1957, a second depredation was visited on Neel. The bulk of his collection of original works was stolen at gunpoint. That is why the earliest originals date from no earlier than the mid 50s. During the 40s and 50s the mere possession of gay erotica was a crime and collectors often called each other, jittery in the middle of the night, afraid they were about to be raided. The artist could not even report an armed robgery to the police because of the nature of the loot. That did not, however, stop his outpouring of work. A neighbor (who walked in on the robbery and was detained along with Neel while the thug's confederate ransacked the apartment for every scrap of a sketch) had something of a nervous breakdown afterware. Neel was busy that evening, drawing as usual.

The closet most gay men were in at that time was something of a refuge, and Neel, along with his art, withdrew into it somewhat; but only temporarily. The 60s, of course, changed everthing and Neel started to sell privately to friends. BLADE was the name he adopted when, in the mid-70s, he finally decided to let his erotic drawings be published and shown publicly. Subsequently he discovered a cash of early pencil drawings on typewriter paper (late 50s/early 60s). Apart from being fascinating works of art, they are artifacts of the modern history of gay sexual imagery.

Neel Bate continued to produce work well into the 1980s. He was, however, a heavy smoker and died of emphysema on June 27, 1989, shortly after the advent of AIDS.

_______________________________________

RECOLLECTIONS AND IMPRESSIONS OF NEEL
By Gene Tunesi

I knew Neel from 1958 through 1962 while I lived on 22nd St. in Chelsea with Barney Owen in his apartment above Neel and (sometimes with Ernest Henry). Our coven of queens includes Jack Evans (aka, Wilton Wiggins), Jerry Comiskey, Larry Nelson and Otis Bigelow.

New to New York, I began collecting pornography, always preferring drawing to photographs. I began photographing borrowed collections, amassing a respectable collection of my own. Neel learned of my darkroom activities and asked to see my work. He came upon a series I and friends called the "Motorcycle Series" of two guys in a barn during a rainstorm. He commented on how badly they'd been reproduced because, he said, he'd drawn the oiginals and he felt each generation of reproductions and tracings had reduced the quality to and abominable level. Later he showed me his original works so I could compare the quality. He liked showing me drawings he was working on, using me as an audience, I guess. Early on, I did comment that he should draw more uncircumcised dicks 'cause that was MY preference. I used to particularly enjoy how he drew wonderful veins on cocks.

He and Ernest Henry had a display-manufacturing business. Ernest (an ex-gymnast, I was told) handled the mechanical end, with Neel doing the creative work and setting up displays in store windows. At one time, they needed some drafting done, showing details of point-of-sale counters and cabinets. That helped to keep me in money during my early days in the city. In later years, though nothing was ever said, I felt Neel "found" work for me, just to occasionally help me with spending money.

I don't know at what point the display business faltered, but he took on any menial project offered to keep money coming in. Once, he spoke of a commission to cover an entire bathroom with erotic figures. Don't know whose bathroom. I did see his mural work on the walls of a short-order restaurant on 8th Ave. between 23rd and 22nd named Edie's. He painted Chelsea street scenes in antique sepia tones. That would be about 1960.

Uptown, just south of the George Washington Bridge, there was a sexaully active section under the West Side Highway (this would be the 1950s into the 60s), where sections were divided into sexual preferences and by hanging around a chosen section, it was an announcement of one's preference. Neel said he (and others) had done elaborate drawings on the raw concrete walls and ceilings. However, by the time I went there to see it all, it was changed. Neel said the local precinct police had encourage Puerto Rican boys to go in wih rocks and broken bottles to drive out the "pansies" while the cops looked the other way. After the gays were driven out and the sexual action ceased, the cops got the kids to paint out the art. I remember the primary colors used were white and silver. I felt cheated not to have seen the original works of art.

Neel said George Platt Lynes had left some of his portrait-size original negatives of young men with him for safe keeping. I never saw them and have always wondered what happened to them.

I do know in his last years, suffering from emphysema and nearly penniless, he was selling things from his apartment just to make ends meet. I've no idea of what he liquidated or to whom he sold. Possibly Ernest Henry might know, since at that time, he had re-entered Neel's life.

My personal observation: I saw a sad aura about him and he seemed to always be seeking approval or acknowledgment. I used to think he should wear a "kick me" sign on his back.

__________________________________________

A FINAL WORD ON BLADE...
By Ling He

(Editor's note: Ling is a volunteer at LLGAF and was given the "privileged" assignment to catalogue all of Blade's work in the George Dudley Archive.)
Ling imparts a few of his impressions...

Blade's works contain both practical (pornographic) and aesthetic value that has appeal to anyone with a gay sensibility and an appreciation for the erotic. His works are inspirations that evoke imagination and sexual urges. Each piece is like a shell collected from the beach — each with its own story. That each expatiates a different tale and that the viewer shares an appreciation for the erotic, is the very matter that enables Blade's work to differ with — and prevail over — hackneyed pornography.

__________________________________________

The Leslie-Lohman Gay Art Foundation is fortunate to have in its permanent collection the bulk of the estate of Neel Bate's work.

Most works are colored pencil on paper, a few on board. There are also many preliminary sketches on tracing paper.