Despite Controversy, No Children Harmed at Tom of Finland’s West
Hollywood Erotic Art Fair

Issues of “Physique Pictorial” were sold at WeHo-LA Erotic Art Fair

The 16th Annual West Hollywood – Los Angeles Erotic Art Fair went off without a hitch this past weekend, and the kids, as far as we know, are perfectly alright.

Earlier in the year, members of the West Hollywood Arts and Cultural Affairs Commission refused to put their seal of approval on the event, saying that children could somehow be harmed.

The commission’s decision stunned the gay community in Los Angeles and caused an uproar.

West Hollywood City Council members eventually overrode the commission, allowing the erotic art fair, which is sponsored by the Tom of Finland Foundation, to take place at West Hollywood Park Auditorium.

West Hollywood Patch reporter James Mills notes that folks at the fair were still concerned about the controversy.

“The most alarming thing is none of the people on that commission are our enemies. They are one of us,” Dan Berkowitz, co-chair of the West Hollywood Lesbian and Gay Advisory Board and a former president of the Tom of Finland Foundation, told WeHo Patch. “When the LGBT community is attempting to censor its own … things are really in trouble.”

Commission members are appointed to their posts by West Hollywood City Council members John Heilman, Abbe Land, John Duran, Jeff Prang, and John D’Amico.

During the recent West Hollywood City Council race, longtime incumbents John Heilman and Abbe Land, who were running for re-election when the erotic art fair controversy broke out, were criticized for helping to de-gay West Hollywood.

The city’s poor handling of the erotic art fair was cited as an example by critics.

This weekend, Heilman and Land made personal appearances at the fair, which featured many drawings and paintings of naked men.

Original issues of old school gay magazines from the early 1960s such as Physique Pictorial were also for sale.

The crowd was made up of mostly gay men in their thirties, forties, and older, with volunteers always standing outside the doors leading into the fair.

The few children who live in West Hollywood — U.S. Census figures show the city is not, and has never been, a place filled with kids — were not allowed anywhere near the auditorium.

There have been no public reports of anyone being offended by the erotic art fair.

Mr. L.A. Leather 2011 Leo Iriarte, however, did make a triumphant appearance.

Contact Patrick Range McDonald at pmcdonald@laweekly.com.

Un sondage exclusif dans TÊTU: Un homo sur quatre a déjà été agressé physiquement

Des chiffres inquiétants qui servent de point d’entrée à un grand dossier consacré à la police et à la lutte contre les actes de violences homophobes.

English translation thru babylon.com:

Robert Mapplethorpe’s X Portfolio series sparked national attention in the early 1990s when it was included in The Perfect Moment, a traveling exhibition funded by National Endowment for the Arts. The portfolio includes some of Mapplethorpe’s most explicit imagery. Though Mapplethorpe’s work had been regularly displayed in publicly funded exhibitions, conservative and religious organizations, such as the American Family Association seized on this exhibition to vocally oppose government support for what they called “nothing more than the sensational presentation of potentially obscene material.” As a result, Mapplethorpe became something of a cause célèbre for both sides of the American Culture war. The installation of The Perfect Moment in Cincinnati resulted in the unsuccessful prosecution of the Contemporary Arts Center of Cincinnati and its director, Dennis Barrie, on charges of “pandering obscenity”.

Much attention was given to the Robert Mapplethorpe photographs that became the center of controversy when they were exhibited at the Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center in 1990, but less was known about Dennis Barrie, the museum director responsible for the exhibit. Barrie’s obscenity trial and condemnation by right-wing conservatives are the focus of this Showtime telepic. Played by James Woods, Barrie is shown standing up for his museum’s right to display controversial art and coping with the toxic windfall that surrounded his actions. Diana Scarwid gives plenty of support as Dianne, Barrie’s wife, and interviews with personalities ranging from Susan Sarandon to Salman Rushdie are interspersed with the film’s narrative. Thanks to the cooperation of the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, a number of the actual photographs that were at the heart of the controversy were used in the production.

~ Rebecca Flint Marx, Rovi

Dirty Pictures

SEE IT ON HULU

Studio call: 7:50.

Wants to talk about Weekend.
History of Foundation.
Working with Arts Commission.

If anyone wants to call in – let us know. It might be good to have some set questions.

Call-In telephone number
1-818-602-4929

Donkey Punch Radio

JIMMY PALMIERI
Sat. 19th 8p

ONLINE BROADCAST

For the 53rd Venice Biennale, the Danish and Nordic Pavilions host “The Collectors“, an exhibition curated and staged by artist duo Elmgreen & Dragset. With contributions from twenty-four international artists, Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset transform the Danish and Nordic Pavilions into domestic environments, and invite the audience to be guests in them.

The artists and designers included in the exhibition are: Thora Dolven Balke, Massimo Bartolini, Hernan Bas, Guillaume Bijl, Maurizio Cattelan, Elmgreen & Dragset, Pepe Espaliú, Tom of Finland, Simon Fujiwara, Han & Him, Laura Horelli, Martin Jacobson, William E. Jones, Terence Koh, Jani Leinonen, Klara Lidén, Jonathan Monk, Nico Muhly, Norway Says, Henrik Olesen, Nina Saunders, Vibeke Slyngstad, Sturtevant and Wolfgang Tillmans. Other features Fredrik Sjöberg’s Fly Collection, Massimo De Carlo’s Porcelain Collection, Collected Etnographica, Real Estate Agents performed by Helen Statman & Trevor Stuart.

The Collectors is not a group show in the conventional sense. The pavilions will undergo a radical reconstruction, and more than twenty artists and designers of all ages, ranging from established to emerging ones, will contribute to creating a different kind of exhibition format, one that will appear closer to a film set than a conventional art display. The curators aim to establish a unique atmosphere of intimacy with their staged exhibition; one that can run counter to the official spectacle and formal nature of the Biennale – and, in close collaboration with the participating artists and designers, they hope to circumvent all the usual competitive aspects of the larger art event.

The Collectors. Curated by Elmgreen & Dragset. Danish Pavilion, 53rd Venice Biennial 2009. La Biennale di Venezia 2009: Fare Mondi (Making Worlds). Professional Preview, June 4, 2009.

VERNISSAGE TV

Mr. Midwest Leather, Philip Hitchcock, is featured in an 18 month calendar with twenty leather clad (and unclad!) photographs shot by Shannen Green.

The sepia toned, 40 page calendar runs through June 2012 and sells for $24.95.

Proceeds from the sale of the calendar benefit Tom of Finland Foundation. 

To order by credit card:

Pleasure Dome

The upcoming Erotic Art Fair Weekend (March 25-27) is a pleasure dome. It is a time to come together, celebrate and indulge in Beauty. It can be seen as a special garden exposition where one can appreciate, and take home for our own gardens, a variety that speaks to us.

TOM OF FINLAND (Finnish, 1920 – 1991)
Untitled (Detail), 1981, Graphite on paper
ToFF #81.23, © 1981 Tom of Finland Foundation

It takes everyone’s participation to keep Gay culture alive and thriving. Each generation and its leaders have the responsibility to secure our due place in history. One of the most important and powerful players from our community is the artist Tom of Finland. Since the mid ‘50s, his drawings have depicted happy, affirmative Gay men relating to each other through love, sex, respect and friendship.

Tom pioneered a major, positive shift on how we perceive ourselves and how we are perceived. We have to remember that for some, we are still seen as strange, and even perverse, in our natures. We must maintain an environment that nurtures esteem.

The Culture

The LGBT Community has arrived at the threshold of acceptance into broader western culture. All of our rights as people have not been fully restored, yet that time is within our sight. The most difficult sticking point is our display of physical affection and sexual activities that affect the levels of “discomfort” in the non-Gay’s world.

Recently, a red flag was sent up to us all when the City of West Hollywood’s Art and Cultural Affairs Commission voted unanimously not to endorse the Tom of Finland Foundation’s Erotic Art Fair Weekend. The annual West Hollywood – Los Angeles event has been co-sponsored by the City since 2003 and this year the City Council again voted to co-sponsor the Weekend.

Three of the City’s commissioners are Gay men. We have to be aware of our tendencies to sell ourselves short in order to gain acceptance by the larger world. A world – a majority – that has often disregarded, and at times outright discouraged, aspects of who we are.

In a recent letter sent to West Hollywood city officials, we reminded them that Gays are a tribe – like an indigenous people – with our own rites and rituals. Like our American Indian brothers, we too have endured discrimination and alienation. The Erotic Art Fair Weekend in an international gathering, honoring who has gone before and where we are now. We can only know where we are going if we know where we are and have been.

Tom of Finland Foundation – your Foundation – and we are yours – has protected, preserved and promoted the erotic arts for 27 years: The arts that reflect who we are as a people.

You Matter

Your attendance at this festival contributes to some very essential and fundamental elements of what it is to be Gay. First of all, you are telling your own community’s artists that they matter – that their work matters. You encourage artists to keep developing and sharing what they see. Second, you will cultivate yourself by feeding your identity – an individual part of a remarkable and courageous family. It is reaffirming to be in the presence of others with whom we share likes and desires. Come and partake.