Exhibition

ANTHONY FRIEDKIN: Gay, A Photographic Essay

June 20th -August 2nd, 2009

Reception for the artist Saturday, June 20th, 7-10pm
complimentary valet parking

drkrm.gallery is pleased to announce the exhibition of Anthony Friedkin’s Gay, A Photographic Essay 1969 – 1972 in commemoration of the 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riot and Gay Pride month. The exhibit will be on view at the drkrm. gallery from June 20th to August 2nd, 2009. There will be a reception honoring the photographer on Saturday June 20 from 7-10pm.

This retrospective exhibition of photographs about the Gay community revisits work done by celebrated Los Angeles based photographer Anthony Friedkin. This powerful and important set of vintage photographs, over 35 years old, historically documents what was then the emerging identity of the homosexual community, and the beginnings of the Gay Liberation Movement. First displayed in a Los Angeles exhibit in 1973 and later again in 1994 it’s been over fifteen years since these unique and beautifully printed vintage photographs have been on view.

In 1969 when he was still a student, Friedkin embarked on The Gay Essay. A series of pictures made in Los Angeles and San Francisco that is the first extensive record of the Gay communities in these cities. This work is an early example of the influence of Diane Arbus outside NY, examining as it does the underbelly of a vibrant and yet marginalized community. The Gay Essay functions as a time capsule and a valuable historic record of a fiercely proud community struggling for acceptance and integration.

The essay shows Gay men and women both proudly and intensely living an openly Gay lifestyle. “They were defining their sense of freedom and individuality,” says Friedkin, who choose at the time to portray Gay people who refused to conform to society’s values. “I wanted to depict their struggles, humiliations, and their triumphs.”

The images in the exhibit depict a wide-ranging composite of gay life: young hustlers, drag queens, transsexuals, San Francisco entertainers; a Gay Liberation parade in Hollywood; two lesbian women very much in love; effeminate boys growing up in an environment of machismo and the religious subculture typical of East Los Angeles

Tags: Anthony Friedkin's Gay, drkrm, Gay Liberation Movement, Gay Pride month, los angeles, Stonewall Riot