GLR November-December 2022

Grant Wood. Readers of James Saslow’s Pictures and Passions (1999) will recognize some of Lucioni’s homoerotic symbolism, which are also present in Demuth’s rising towers and silos, Hartley’s ardent male lovers and rising mountain peaks, O’Keeffe’s voluptuous fleshy mountains and gigantic flowers, and Woods’ ripe, swelling fields and rolling meadows—visions of youth and beauty. Lucioni was one of the gay artists of his generation who were unmoored in a sea of change. His work, mainly his por traits (though he did not consider himself a portraitist), are among the most electrically charged portrayals of gay men in modern art history. I now understand why Romaine Brooks was interested in Lu cioni’s work. Upon closely examining their queer gaze through reading Brody’s book, I recognize their shared twilight vision as a response to the heterosexism of the times. Nonetheless, emerg ing Modernism provided a relatively safe space in bohemia for Lucioni and others to create their vibrant gay art. Among his best portraits are of artists and lovers Paul Cadmus and Jared French; photographer Carl Van Vechten; and Ethel Waters, the bisexual singer and actress. Luigi Lucioni: Modern Light is a beautifully produced book that any art collector would proudly display. Somewhat unfor tunately, the book is being marketed by Rizzoli Electa’s pub licity team as just another art book without reference to its special interest to LGBT readers or its importance to LGBT art history and culture. It belongs to a growing library of books that underscore the many contribution that gay artists have made to society and culture.

Julius Eastman: Composer, Performer, Iconoclast ART MEMO

J OHN R. K ILLACKY I N 1970’S NEWYORK, Julius Eastman was an outrageous presence in the avant-garde performance scene as a composer, singer, and pianist. Black and openly gay, he was an outsider. He died homeless and forgotten in 1990. As the music world grapples with righting the canon, there is a resurgence of interest in this sui generis artist. Eastman was nominated for a Grammy in 1974 for his recording of Peter Maxwell Davies’ Eight Songs for a Mad King . In 1975, as a member of the experimental S.E.M. music ensemble, Eastman tackled John Cage’s koan-like instructions for “Solo for Voice No. 8,” which read: “In a situation provided with maximum amplification (no feedback), perform a disciplined action, with any interruptions, fulfilling in whole, or in part, an obligation to others.” Eastman played his own queerness as an instrument in the performance. A Black woman and a white man were invited onstage to strip while Eastman ranted and camped it up as ensemble musicians improvised an elec

tronic soundscape. A review in the Buffalo Evening News stated: “Eastman’s leering, li bidinous, lecture-performance had everyone convulsed with the burlesque broadness of his homoerotic satire.” I first became aware of Eastman as a per former in Meredith Monk’s Dolmen Music (1979). In a recent conversation, Monk fondly remembered him as “full of contra dictions, but so intelligent with an essential love and devotion to music itself.” She en joyed working with him on Dolmen Music , doubling up on the falsetto and lower parts. He played keyboards during the develop ment of a second piece, Turtle Dreams (1981), but then did not want to go on tour. As a colleague, “he was so supportive of my music and taught me a lot about theory and harmony,” she said. Eastman’s own compositions challenged prevailing æsthetic norms that were very straight, very white, and very male. East man told The Buffalo Times in 1976 that he aspired “to be what I am to the fullest: Black to the fullest, a musician to the fullest, and a homosexual to the fullest.” Classically trained in voice and composition

at the Curtis Institute of Music, his music was structurally proto-minimalist, fre quently using multiple grand pianos awash in overtones. He called it “organic music.” While his titles were sometimes provoca tive— Crazy Nigger (1978 ) , Gay Guerilla (1979), and Nigger Faggot (1978) among them—the music itself was transcendent. He conducted his 1974 symphony Feme nine wearing a dress. Vocal and piano scores as well as disco recordings round out his genre-fluid œuvre. Wherever I would see Eastman, whether onstage, in gay clubs, or working at Tower Records, his outsized personality captured the public’s gaze. However, he became in creasingly erratic, struggling economically and with substance abuse. Evicted for non payment of rent in the early 1980s, sheriffs threw out his scores, papers, and belong ings. He lived in homeless shelters and out doors in a city park when not couch-surfing with friends, while still performing and composing sporadically. Meredith Monk said he would occasionally show up at her loft at odd hours, and she would feed him. “Afterward we would play four-handed

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