Art After Stonewall; Now, More Relevant Than Ever

Miles G. Cohen
Nov 4 · 3 min read

Denzil Centrecourt studied the roughly 20-foot-tall tapestry before him, which featured the two stick figures — dotted with pink and purple — holding each other’s manhood underneath a yellow banner that read “Safe Sex”.

“That’s an impressionist style,” said Centrecourt, 60, a Guyanese sketch-artist who has been sleeping below the windows of NYU’s Grey Art Gallery. “Only the details that matter are included.”

NYU’s Grey Art Gallery

The Art After Stonewall exhibit opened Wednesday, the first of its kind to display paintings, pictures and portraits subsequent to the Stonewall Riots of 1969.

In 1969, Stonewall Inn — a gay bar just blocks from the art-show — was raided by the New York City Police Department. What ensued were protests, violent clashes, and what the exhibit’s curator, Jonathan Weinberg, called, “a turning point in queer civil rights.”

Weinberg also notes that despite the raised awareness, members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBTQ) community still had to advocate for their rights.

In the exhibition, a cacophony of voices echoed from TV screens, each playing a scene from the Gay Liberation Movements of the 1970’s and 80’s.

Christian Liclair, an art writer who focuses on sexual art of the 1970’s, watched as marchers held up signs emblazoned with right-side-up pink triangles and bore the message, “SILENCE=DEATH”.

Liclair said that he is fascinated with the symbolism of the triangle, and has written several articles about it, including a piece for a German art journal.

“SILENCE=DEATH, printed in white Gill Sans capital letters underneath a pink triangle, quickly evolved as ACT UP’s [AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power’s] iconic ‘trademark’ and would subsequently become AIDS activism’s visual equivalent,” Liclair wrote.

That same pink triangle could be seen in all corners of the exhibition, including on one framed piece that came fron the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art.

According to its description, members of the ‘Silence=Death’ Project were, “unable to find a single photo that could communicate the extent of the crisis [so]…the group settled on a downward pointing pink triangle that had been used by the Nazis to brand gay men during the holocaust. In the 1970’s it was reclaimed as a symbol of pride.”

Liclair said that although most of the art depicts scenes and symbols from historical movements, it still retains its relevance.

“In the current environment with Trump, gay rights are under fire,” he said. “The progress that was made cannot be forgotten.”

Liclair noticed that while gay men were well-represented at the exhibition, it had very little in the way of lesbian art. He suspected that this was due to the curators focus on the movement’s sexual undertones — those associated with the contraction of AIDS.

“Female sexuality is different from male sexuality,” Liclair said. “Where male sexuality is focused on genital sexuality and intercourse, female sexuality is more sensual in nature.”

Centrecourt pointed at a painting of a man lying in a hospital bed, bordered by white numerals starting at “1” and counting up to “88.”

“I believe it represents the people who die every minute [of AIDS],” he said.

Centrecourt first remembered hearing about the disease from his mother. After the family emigrated from Guyana in 1969 to New York, she began working as a Registered Nurse in Queens. It was during that time when she would tell him that she saw countless people die from AIDS.

Centrecourt looked up again at the painting.

“This really sends a message,” he said.

Miles G. Cohen

Written by

Student journalist at New York University writing about food, folks and fine arts.

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