By request...Thread for discussion of Gay Art and Artists

[quote]Somebody who isn't a cheap bitch (read: me) should create a Gay Art/Artist thread. Art is one field where so many of the great practitioners were gay, or at least dabbled in the homosex.

• OP here In line with this thread, I saw in promos that Starz is starting a mini-series on March on Da Vinci, titled Da Vinci's demons. Of course, they are including naked love scenes of him with his FEMALE lovers....since he was such a great lover of women...NOT. I am boycotting it.

• What was Rauschenberg and Johns' relationship like? Are there any good bios on either?

• No such thread would be complete without at least one Michaelangelo "ignudo".

  http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/06/Michelangelo,_ignudo_18.jpg

• One more.

  http://www.terminartors.com/files/artworks/6/1/5/6151/Michelangelo-Ignudo.jpg

• Well, what's another one.

  http://www.chinaoilpaintinggallery.com/oilpainting/Michelangelo/Ignudo-15.jpg

• The relationship between Van Gogh and Gauguin is very interesting. The common belief is that, during the time they spent together in France, the two painted and caroused. Gauguin eventually fled when Van Gogh's mental instabilities become too much for him, and they never saw each other again. But some have speculated that they may have been lovers. At the very least, Van Gogh seemed to be infatuated with Gauguin. In preparation for his visit, he bought two beds and insisted they sleep side by side. When he feared Gauguin would leave him, he lashed out bitterly. And when he finally left, Van Gogh wrote him imploring letters. It's almost like the behavior of a scorned or unrequited lover. That said, there really is no evidence that they had a sexual relationship, or that there was even any sexual desire on Van Gogh's part. Maybe it was a kind of extreme hero worship.

• I remember when Rauschenberg died, and there was some controversy over how little mention there was of his being gay in the obituaries. Of course, they never forgot to mention the fact that he was married at one point and had a child. Weird and disheartening that, even in the arts, people are being nudged into the closet. Who do you think are the best new gay artists of today? I like David Altmejd. I also like Ryan McGinley. Is Wade Guyton gay? He's one of the most successful artists of his generation. He recently had a show at the Whitney and his work sells for a lot of money. He seems low key about his personal life, but I'm pretty sure he's gay. Check out this video interview. And he's hot!

  http://www.interviewmagazine.com/art/wade-guyton/

• That Guyton interview is from five years ago. He's even sexier now:

  http://andreafazzari.com/blog/2012/03/wade-guyton/

• Does anyone know about Bjarne Melgaard? He's a NY-based Norwegian artist with a lot of buzz right now. He just signed with super-dealer Gavin Brown. He's openly gay, and hot if you're into bears. There's a video interview and pics and the link:

  http://holtermanndesign.com/%3Fp%3D2016

• [quote] Van Gogh wrote him imploring letters. It's almost like the behavior of a scorned or unrequited lover. ...or the behavior of someone who was mentally ill, who was outside the artistic establishment that he both despised and wanted to be a part of, who trained himself without the advice of a "master," who was lonely, shit-ass broke, and desperate. I can't think of an artist more emphatically heterosexual than Van Gogh.

• As Sister Wendy said of a David Hockney painting: "Two themes he loved: blue skies and beautiful boys."

• Gay & Jewish Victorian painter Simeon Solomon: " generation before Oscar Wilde's famous trial and imprisonment, another brilliant career was tragically cut short by the homophobia and intolerance of victorian english society. On February 11th, 1873, two men were arrested for attempted sodomy in a public lavatory in Stratford Place Mews, off Oxford Street, in London. One of the men was Simeon Solomon, a promising young artist, then 33 years old, whose work had been exhibited at the Royal Academy. The other man was a 60 year old stableman named George Roberts. Both men were sentenced to 18 month's hard labor, the same sentence that destroyed Oscar Wilde 20 years later. Simeon Solomon served only 2 weeks of his sentence before being released on bail. Thanks to the help of Myer Salaman*, a wealthy cousin, his sentence was reduced to police supervision and a £100 fine a month later. George Roberts served his entire 18 month sentence. Although he was released from jail, Solomon was ostracized by proper English society and his promising career abruptly ended, almost as if he had died. He fled to France after his release, but in 1874 he was arrested again in Paris and sentenced to 3 months in prison. Simeon Solomon was thus thrust into obscurity just as he was achieving fame as an artist."

  http://www.dxsuperpremium.com/2008/11/tragic-life-of-simeon-solomon.html

  Lord Leighton

• R12, And from the same article: [quote] In 1885, Solomon moved into the St. Giles Workhouse, a sort of homeless shelter, where he continued to work and live for the last 20 years of his life. He was reduced to begging and selling matchsticks on the street. Unable to afford paint and canvas, he usually worked with pastels and charcoal on salvaged scraps of cardboard and paper. Yet he created some of his most beautiful work in this late period.

• Sad story, R12. Does anyone know about gay artists between the Renaissance and the twentieth century? The Renaissance obviously had Da Vinci and Michelangelo, and the twentieth century had more major gay/bisexual artists than any other it seems (Bacon, Warhol, Basquiat, Hockney, Johns, Rauschenberg, etc). But I don't know much about the intervening periods. I've read some speculation on Munch.