From downtown Pride marches to the ballrooms of Harlem and the South Bronx, New York City’s history is hugely informed by its status as a beacon for queer creativity. A new exhibition at the Museum of the City of New York will explore this through 100 years of artistic LGBTQ expression and the relationships it birthed. Through photographs, illustrations, and iconography, Gay Gotham: Art and Underground Culture in New York celebrates art that has oftentimes remained hidden even throughout LGBTQ history’s most well-documented eras. Visitors will likely be familiar with Robert Mapplethorpe, Andy Warhol, Leonard Bernstein, and Mae West, the Bushwick-born Hollywood sex symbol who was a gay icon for seven decades. Lesser-known but still important figures include lesbian feminist artist Harmony Hammond and genderqueer doll-maker Greer Lankton, the East Village icon who created theatrical installations for the windows of East 7th Street boutique Einstein’s.
Gay Gotham celebrates not just a community but the relationships that emerged through its thriving art scene: Warhol and Mercedes de Acosta; Mapplethorpe and Cecil Beaton; fashion photographer George Platt Lynes and his playwright friend Gertrude Stein. Also included in the exhibition are letters, snapshots, and ephemera — often scandal-provoking — that highlight the importance of solidarity and personal bonds in the face of oppression.
“Gay Gotham: Art and Underground Culture in New York” is on view at the Museum of the City of New York from October 7, 2016 through February 26, 2017.
Credits
Text Hannah Ongley
Images courtesy of Museum of the City of New York