Tag Archives: LGBT

Nov13

The Semi-Naked Truth of John Palatinus: People from the Village

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I have always been fascinated with the distinction between artistic, erotic, and pornographic. The fine lines between the forms (if there are any lines at all) are tested by a lot of artists, some times to provoke, other times to test, and in some instances, well, just because it happened.

I remember the first time I saw a picture of a naked man. I was in that stage between not too young and not old enough, and its source was so unexpected that I remember surprise overtaking every other single feeling.
It was in a magazine. I remember going to the newsstand, and seeing the corner of a cover hidden behind a pile of other magazines on the top shelf. Now, you have to believe me, I really did not know why these magazines were on the top shelf, why they were covered in plastic, or why parts of them had small stickers blocking parts of the cover picture. I just read ‘great competition’ on the cover, and as I was going through the stage of collecting everything, I grabbed it, went to the counter, and even though I thought it was strange that the cashier asked me twice if I knew what I was buying, I accepted his offer for a black bag and went home.

I remember going in the living room, taking the magazine out of the bag and out of its plastic case, and opening it. The feature it was in started with a guy wearing a flannel shirt, black trousers and boots. His hair was curly and his face long. It seemed like every shot magically took one piece of clothing off him, so, when I turned the page, there he was, naked. I had never seen a picture of a naked man before. It was so strange. He was so …different. His penis was the strangest, weirdest thing I had seen up until that moment; don’t get me wrong, growing up in Greece meant getting your fair share of nude sculptures in museums, naked lithographs in history books and if participating in sports, locker rooms with other naked men. But the fact that this was on a magazine made this experience totally different. It was not meant to be artistic; it was intended to be erotic-even though it ended being pornographic.

So being in Space Station 65 and standing in front of John Palatinus‘s naked portraits of men is making me think of these distinctions. Male sexual photography was defined, stigmatised, and redefined during the 1950s, and Palatinus was one of the key figures in this era.
During that period, photographers started taking portraits of handsome men with built bodies, that as time passed they started losing items of clothing. The images were printed in magazines like Tomorrow’s Man, or mailed directly to customers in the pretence of admiring the male physique. However, when full-frontal pictures started emerging, the authorities stepped in and arrested various publishers, photographers, and models.

One of these photographers was John Palatinus. When the New York police department and the US Postage Inspectors raided his apartment, they confiscated all of his prints, photographs, original negatives, cameras, lights, and equipments. After a conviction of Conspiracy and a misdemeanour charge, Palatinus was disgraced, out of business, and most importantly robbed out of his whole back work.

Now, you might be reading this and thinking ‘well, what work? This was pornography!’. And that is where the fine line lies. Even though the pictures were sexually charged, they would be described as erotic instead of pornographic. They were admiring the male form instead of cheapening it. Palatinus got rid of the cheesy props and the cheap backdrops, and used white backgrounds, lights and shadow to highlight the topography of the male physique.

Countless of shoots have been informed from Palatinus’s work, and some have actually completely copied his style (giving him credit, of course). This is why archivist and curator of vintage physique photography, Alan Harmon, was extremely surprised when he after speaking with Palatinus, he discovered they not only lived close by, but would embark on a mission to retrieve a lot of his photography from various sources.

A large portion of his work has been recovered, and can be seen on the walls of Space Station 65. From the risqué to the explicit, it is the demure that seem to hide questions about sexuality, arousal, erotica and, well, art.

This made me think of the homoerotically charged imagery of Ambercrombie & Fitch, and the Men’s Health magazines that use simular poses and eventually claim to serve the same purpose: admire the male physique. The classic cover shot with a man looking down at his toned torso with a smile on his face is tinted with a hint of eroticism that can be found in that early male physique photography.

The camera might be digital now, but the light still captures the same questions, the same social mysteries, the same fine lines that make the edges of the pixels.

‘click’

Love,

G

Jul2

Being Greek

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My skin is now tanned. My eyes carry a sadness around the corners, and I have the distinct feeling that I have trapped a breath in my chest, that I can’t seem to be able to breath out.
Last week, i had to visit my home country, as I needed to attend two funerals. I am Greek. I grew up in the hot, buzzing streets of Athens. People around me walked slow, talked fast, argued loudly and laughed louder. They gathered in the squares, with tea lights roped on the trees over them, the pavement cooling down under the night sky, children talking to each other, adults talking about each other, traditional music in the background for the older ones and foreign music in the foreground for the younger ones. Later we would go to the open-air cinema, eating a cheese-pie and coca cola from the can, reading the subtitles under the well groomed Hollywood faces.
I felt the sun kissing my face in the long summers, I run in the olive fields and dived in the crystal blue seas. I had this constant smell of sunscreen, and my skin was always salty, my hair always wet and my bathing suit always on. I would pick figs from the neighbour’s tree, and eat them under its shade. I smelt feta cheese roasting in the oven, fresh bread on the bakery windows, cheese and spinach pies resting on the kitchen counter.
Before mobile phones made me instantly available, my parents knew they could always find me in the city centre. I spent hours in Eleftheroudakis bookshop, walking down the isles, touching the spine of every book, eyes widening at the sight of unusual images, interesting titles, exotic covers. I would then make my way down to Metropolis, a CD and later DVD shop, and make countless wish-lists. I would walk down Monastiraki, Sintagma, Ermou, stopping in front of the shop windows, looking at the things in the shop, the people in the shop, the exchange of money for objects of desired happiness.
I don’t want to give an idea of false perfection. All of the above always happened behind a smoke screen, kindly provided by the 20pack of cigarettes of the person next to you. Compulsive smoking, innate judgement, and an unjustifiably rigid sense of morality. Anything that deviated from the norm has to be hidden; if not hidden, punished; and if not punished, at least humiliated. Men can (and often are encouraged to) cheat, personally and professionally, as long as they are white heterosexuals with an embedded sense of entitlement. Homosexuality is ridiculed and hidden, represented as a thinly tolerated anomaly that should be buried away from public view, varying from a moustache to a full blown wife and children.
The military is mandatory, meaning that you have to give a year of your life to stay in a camp in the far end corner of the country – unless your family has political connection, and can secure you an office position three blocks away from your semi-detached house. Indeed, family connections are everything: it is the only way to get a job, progress in it, make any kind of money and then hide it from the tax office. Tax evasion is a skin cell of the Greek epidermis; why do something right, when you can do it quick? What is the greater good if it’s not good for you?
The younger generation is sitting in the squares, having coffee and complaining about life. A small percentage will stay on the complains, and will not move into action. If you can stay at your parents home, file a few papers in their work place and have enough pocket money to pay you club entry, then why skip the sports pages for the Job classifieds? However, a big percentage is looking for jobs in their chosen field, with degrees from Greek and foreign Universities gathering dust in their bedroom drawers as they are knocking on doors that are locked and bolted. without a strong connection, a diploma is just worth as much as the paper that it is printed on. And then, if your parents can not really support you, what?
There is a small tinge of racism, especially towards Albanians, Pakistanis and Nigerians, economic refugees that are accused for stealing jobs from the Greeks; jobs that a lot of Greeks would consider beneath them, or too badly paid. Even so, extreme left parties have gained momentum, with a range of accusations against them.
All of these viewpoints are not shared by every Greek; but unfortunately, the overwhelming majority would nod acceptingly with most of the above, if not all. I don’t. I loved growing up in Greece, but once I did, I was unsure about how I felt in it. I did not really fit in all of the times, in most ways. Even though I was a piece of the puzzle, my edges seemed slightly different. I did not fit the profile, the macho tough bike-loving, sports-playing, cigarette in one hand and coffee on the other kind of person. And on top of that, I was not ashamed of who I was, of how different I was. I always smiled when people told me I needed to fit in; why be happy, when you can be normal?
And all that said, I still feel Greece as a beloved part of me. My home is London now, and I moved away physically and emotionally as well. My feelings for Greece is a bittersweet traditional desert, served in a crowded square, under tea lights and smoking bystanders.
So, every time that I tell someone I am Greek, I am telling him all of this in a simple statement of origin. I am telling him of my pride and my shame, of my good and bad memories, of the ups and lows. In the past couple of years, every time I tell a person I am Greek, I get a canned response that is bound to include the word crisis in it, when all i do is just state my origin.
Greece and Greeks are not just the poster boys of a country in a dire economic state. It is a nation that live its good as intensely as its bad, its happiness as tragically as its sadness, smiling at the face of danger, raising a glass to what was instead of what will be. Most of the places I described in my good memories are now closed, bankrupt and covered in angry graffitis. Most of the negative attitudes I mentioned are changing, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worst. I walked in the city centre, and it was empty. The stores closed. Someone wrote on the window of a vacant store: a city that is burning; a flower that is blooming.
My tan will fade away, but I am not sure if my sadness for my country will. All I can do is hope, for change, for light, for the younger generation to have something more that a tanned skin to remember their country by.

Love,

G

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Apr15

Little Joe: Projections in a Clubhouse

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The closest I have been to sitting inside a clubhouse was when I was 7. It was a play-date with a friend from school; he was in my class, blue eyes, blond hair, the new kid in school. His house was a classic Greek apartment, with yellow lights, heavy wooden furnitures, pictures of dead people and lace decorations on marble surfaces. His parents left us in the living room, and they went in the kitchen, where they continued the argument they had before my arrival interrupted them. We sat at the couch. It was a greenish shade of grey, and it was made of 6 pillows: 3 on the bottom, and 3 on the back. We were convinced that there was something behind them; so, we decided to take them off.

3 minutes and a bare sofa later, we were bored. We decided to arrange the pillows into a small house. We used them as walls, and went inside, closing the entrance with the last pillow. There, in the dark, we stood still for a second that lasted hours, laughed with secrets that were shielded from the outside world and believed that life could continue hidden inside these fabric walls forever. We achieved the contentment of living a lifetime in a single moment, of being able to forget that life exists outside the confines of a structure, that times moves on even if you don’t.

That was the feeling I had when I stepped into the Little Joe Clubhouse. Hosted in the Rich Mix (one of the most creative social enterprises in East London) café gallery, the clubhouse was a construct to behold: a specially commissioned structural installation, it managed to serve as hideout and a visual playground at the same time, the structure holding the outside world at distance, evoking a feeling of safety; of peace.

The creators of Little Joe, the most interesting Queer & Film culture magazine, worked day and night to create an absolutely amazing program of rare films that were shown as a part of Fringe!, East London‘s Alternative Film Festival. The crowd could just sit back and enjoy the film, engage in discussions with familiar strangers, or just sit still and feel the creativity buzzing through the space and the people.

The clubhouse was taking most of the space, with a really interesting library on the side, covering all things queer, and a fantastic mini shop (ranging from previous issues and the iconic Little Joe badges, to the special limited edition publication, with contributions from prominent artists, filmmakers and writers) making it the central point of the Fringe! Film Festival.

What I found really striking is the you blink and you miss it quality of this experience; the films are not commercially available, ranging from digitised versions of underground masterpieces to 16mm projections of rare gems. It was not only the structure that was fleeting; it was also the feeling it produced, the ephemeral pleasure that hides a pang of sadness in the knowledge that it is finite. Thankfully, Little Joe is full of events, with one of the best Film Clubs in town, as well as a selection of their back issues in their online store; Rich Mix has a variety of new events; and we will have to wait for next year’s Fringe! for more exciting films.

As far as my first ‘clubhouse’ experience, by the time that his parents came back in the room, all the pillows were back on the couch, and we were on the floor laughing, kicking the air, tears coming out. I can not remember what was so funny; just that we were laughing. I do not talk to him anymore.

Love,

G

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Feb26

Gay’s the Word: The Epicentre of the London LGBT Written Word

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I decided to take the bus today. I had time to kill, a book to read, and a headache creeping up, the reminder of that third glass of wine from yesterday.
The sky was a darker shade of grey when I looked up, and I was near Kings Cross. I checked the time on the screen of my phone, took a deep inhale, and pressed the stop button.
I got off and made my way across the street and into the British Library. I went to the ground floor cafe, queued for a lemon and poppyseed cake, took my latte in a paper cup, and found a table in the corner. I sat in the admittedly uncomfortable chair and turned my phone off.
About two hours later, when my cup was almost empty and my plate licked clean, I decided it was time for a walk. I gulped down the rest of my coffee, got up and wrapped my scarf around my neck as I was walking towards the exit. I knew where I was headed.

I started walking towards the Brunswick centre. I used to live close about 4 years ago, so I knew the streets and shops relatively well. A few more steps, and I would stand in front one of the most important shops in LGBT British identity. And, sure enough, there it was.
Sandwiched between an Internet Cafe and a spa, Gay’s the Word looks a little out of place; a little queer. The blue sign, the wooden frames, the charm that it exudes making it look like it just appeared out of nowhere. If there ever was a gay version of Harry Potter, this would definitely be the Ollivanders Wand shop.
Greeted by a bell on the door and a warm smile at the counter, GTW can not disappoint. It is a literal literary tardis, housing in a relatively small space a plethora of LGBT work: in its shelves, one can find the latest queer studies, academic work, non-fiction, fiction, magazines, DVDs, postcards and small gifts (for others; or yourself; or bought for others, but kept by self).
The space’s relaxed atmosphere is partly due to the clever layout and quirky interior, but mostly to the mesmerising presence of Jim Macsweeney. Cool blue eyes and a knowing smile, Jim greets people that walk in as if they used to know each other from a different past, a different life. He radiates a disarming warmth, his face lighting up when talking about the space, the events, the customers.

I tell him about the first time I saw the store. It was my first year in London, and everything seemed so vast, so chaotic. Apart from my conviction that it was really cool to wear only red and black when going out (the delusions of youth), and that Topman was the centre of the universe (the source of the delusions of youth), I was pretty lost. I was out to my friends from home, but as I was making myself at home here, I did not know where the outside was. I was walking down the street from my student halls with my Sainsbury’s bags, and there I saw it. I stopped; walked past it; stopped; went back to it; inhaled; and walked in.

You see, like for many GTW customers, visiting this shop was a small brick to building my gay identity. It is not a badly lit bookshelf in the corner of a sex shop. It is not a pile of books next to displays of double dildos. It is an actual bookshop, a place where it is ok to be out: out in public; out in press; out in writing; out to the world. I bought a couple of books, went to my room, and read them at the same night, sat on the green rug next my bed, my phone on silent, my eyes sponges soaking up all the words. Since then, I would visit the store almost every month: from my AXM and Attitude copies, to references for my MSc dissertation, I knew I would find everything I wanted there.

Jim smiles. He tells me how the customer age group ranges from 16-85, and how just the other day, two young guys came in the store; the more confident was bringing the novice to browse. We started talking about the importance of a bookshop like this one in the normalising process, and he told me that after 32 years, GTW is the only remaining LGBT bookshop in the UK. Not surprisingly, it was in the Top 50 Independent Bookstores list, and was shortlisted for the Best Bookshop of the Year Award.
What really impressed me though is the unyielding positivity that Jim has. ‘Yes, customers are happy, we are happy, sales are great, everything is fine!’ he says. I look at him suspiciously. ‘What about ebooks?’ I say, ‘surely that must worry you. It is worrying most of the publishing world for their future’. Jim looks at me cryptically, tilts his head and says ‘I prefer to stay in the present. We have survived a lot of other things, and I am sure we will survive this one; ebooks can be something we can look for the future, but for now, life is good as it is.’
A constant LGBT presence, it must be a bit unnerving for him to see popular outlets like Waterstones and HMV to have a G&L section now, after GTW gave a fight for all the years that these stores would never commission LGBT literature. ‘Not at all’ he says, ‘I actually think it is brilliant. It makes LGBT literature visible. It makes it accessible. I would much rather prefer young people walking in their local Waterstones in Cardiff and finding LGBT material available’. He smiles. I am amazed, and a little speechless.

Here is a man and a store that have survived 32 years open, during which they have had their shares of threats and misfortunes, from rent raises to political boycotting. Even after all this, they choose not to be bitter, or miserable, or short-sighted. They choose to celebrate life. They stuck with it when the going was tough, and even if people do not necessarily realise it as they dance in clubs, or hold hands in public, or tell their colleagues they are gay, we owe a lot to this little store.

We close our discussion with talks about community: apart from a weekly Lesbian Discussion Group and monthly Trans Discussion Group, they now have a monthly LGBT Book Club, discussing works that are not necessarily under the LGBT umbrella. And if all this was not enough, Jim tells me how excited he is about the March events, and the work that GTW customers can explore:

First, the fascinating work of psychiatrist and criminologist Donald J West, who 55 years after publishing Homosexuality, can write openly as a gay man about his own experience of marrying a ‘deviant’ sexuality with a ‘mainstream’ career. The event centres around his new book Gay Life, Straight Work (01/03/2012, 19:00-21:00), and is absolutely free.
Then, the new and exciting voice of Justin Torres, in his new coming of age debut novel We the Animals (22/03/2012, 19:00-21:00, £2 entry); and Patrick Gale’s sold out event for his new book A perfectly Good Man. If you want signed copies of the books but can not make it to the events, fret not: just drop them an email at sales@gaystheword.co.uk, and they will find a way to make it happen.

LGBT History Month is almost over. I read a lot of material on the press, about the adversity and difficulties we go though. The discrimination, the pain. I have felt it as well. I know what it feels like, the taste it leaves in your mouth. I know how important it is to put it out there. You know that. However, I think that once it is out there, it is even more important to show the next step. The step of acceptance. The step of moving on. Of celebrating life. Of focusing on the positive. Of looking at the world through rose tinted glasses, that you chose to wear on a cloudy afternoon.

I have mine on now; and the world looks a little bit magnificent.

Love,

G

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