Once known for its radical politics and crude illustrations of hyper-muscular men in varying pornographic poses, gay art has evolved, reflecting broad public acceptance of a variety of sexual dispositions. More important, perhaps, is how many younger gay artists are determined to show just how ordinary their lives can be.
These gay artists choose to show in their work all aspects of life, from blatant sexual embraces to sports play, to moments of solitude, to images evoking the aftermath of a dinner party, or portraits of favored pets who are an intimate part of their daily lives.
In works by this new generation, led by painters like Louis Fratino and Salman Toor, collectors of all stripes can now acquire such works as legitimate acquisitions. Part of what makes these works acceptable is that their challenges are much more muted than works by earlier overtly gay artists, such as was originally the case with Caravaggio, Robert Mapplethorpe and Keith Haring.
At recent auctions, prices for older gay artists, including Francis Bacon, Paul Cadmus, Marsden Hartley, David Hockney, Larry Rivers, Warhol, and Kehinde Wiley rival (and sometimes exceed) prices paid for works by more conventional artists. Indeed, the highest price ever paid for a work by a gay artist was $450 million, for Leonardo Da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi.
Of course, if you don’t have $450 million, there are many works by artists known both locally and nationally, that sell for anywhere from $300 to $50,000. This group includes such artists as Scott Cousins, Jeff Miller, and Dan Romer. (See some of their work on the Pix and Podcast page of this website.)
In a review of hundreds of works by currently living gay artists there are clear references to court art of an earlier age. One can easily see references to the comfortable works by Watteau, Boucher and Fragonard, rather than the edgy or disturbing works of Goya, William Blake or Caravaggio.
In some ways, gay art lags behind its straight counterparts. In particular, the world of gay art is still overwhelmingly dominated by men, although some notable lesbian artists are rising to even the score, including Nicole Eisenman, Nan Goldin and Catherine Opie.
Some critics, including this writer, have noted that the current generation seems more intent to stress the ordinariness of their lives rather than explore new ways to communicate their messages. But there is no shortage of clever self-referencing: In Fratino’s Polaroids on the Kitchen Counter (see photo below), the centerpiece is in fact another Fratino painting.
Another master of witty self-referencing is Kehinde Wiley, whose Napoleon Leading the Army over the Alps cleverly depicts the artist in the role played by Napoleon in the famous propaganda painting by Jacques Louis David.
There is a trap here, where initially radical imagery is overtaken by the commercially acceptable. This is illustrated by the fates of work by Basquiat, Haring and Warhol.
Perhaps it is best that gay art, as with any other kind of art, be included in the mainstream. It may have lost its radical cry for acceptance and liberation, trading the radical for the comfortable, yet maybe that is as it should be. Art, like people, should be judged by its quality and character, rather than the gender of its creator.
Josh Martin
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