![famous gay men from 70s and 80s famous gay men from 70s and 80s](https://66.media.tumblr.com/d3aee8d4b7dcc8294ba1321c76b73189/tumblr_ok8twa6fXN1sy3tjvo1_500.jpg)
In the same year, the artist created other works that profoundly communicated the traumatic experience of losing a loved one to AIDS, seen in Untitled (Perfect Lovers) and Untitled (billboard of an empty bed), both 1991. The seemingly seductive, interactive work is in fact supposed to mirror the tragic decline of his partner. #felixgonzalestorres #American #Cuban #artist #contemporaryart #artlover #artislife #artislove #artcyclopaedia #art #installation #AIDS #homosexual #gay #sweet #conceptualart #visualart #visualcultures #iloveart #NewYork #galleryspace #galleryĪ post shared by estère kajema on at 7:06am PDTĬomprised of 175lbs (nearly 80kg) of wrapped sweets that the public could consume, the amount was chosen to match the bodyweight of Ross as he began to languish due to illness. Gonzalez-Torres’s idea is that a museum owning the work should always refill the pile so that his lover never really dies. The sweetness of candy has both sexual and religious context – by tasting the “body of the dead”, the spectator is destroying the allegory of Ross until it is completely gone. The artist encouraged spectators to take a candy, which clearly made the installation weight less and less, referring to Ross’s weight loss. The installation initially weighted 80 kilograms, corresponding to the weight of Gonzalez-Torres partner, Ross Laycock, who died of AIDS in 1991. Below is a recent instalment of his, Untitled (Portrait of Ross in L.A.), created shortly after his partner's death.įelix Gonzalez-Torres, “Untitled (Portrait of Ross in L.A.)", 1991 Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s work Untitled (Portrait of Ross in L.A.), 1991 is an installation which consists out of a pile of candies, individually wrapped into cellophane, placed in the corner of the room. In 1991, his long-term partner, Ross Laycock, died of complications due to AIDS, which led Gonzales-Torres to create some of his most memorable works. Throughout his career, he made conceptual work relating to his sexual identity and responding to the difficulties of living with HIV/AIDS. The foundation continues to donate funds for medical research to fight against AIDS and HIV.Ĭuban artist Felix Gonzales-Torres was a gay artist working in America. He left behind an important legacy and founded the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Mapplethorpe died on 9th March 1989 at the age of 42. to remove the artist's work from public view. In 1989, Mapplethorpe's work was censored by Helms, who, alongside 100 Congressmen, forced the Corcoran Gallery in Washington D.C. Unabashedly offering new representations of the male body and queerness – sometimes shocking his contemporaries by conflating religious insignia with explicitly sexualised nude photography – Mapplethorpe embodies the LGBTQ+ and BDSM subcultures of his era.Īndy Warhol (1928–1987) National Galleries of ScotlandĪfter the outbreak of AIDS in the late 1970s and early 1980s, figures such as Republican senator Jesse Helms regarded the virus as a 'punishment' for homosexuality, a view shared by many at that time. Like Warhol, Mapplethorpe's artistic status grew into one of legend as he came to prominence against the backdrop of New York's sexual liberation and the freewheeling creativity flourishing in places like the Chelsea Hotel between the 1960s and 1980s.
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In 1983, Andy Warhol created this silkscreen painting of Robert Mapplethorpe, a pioneering photographer known for his homoerotic visions of the male nude. A pink triangle against a black backdrop with the words 'Silence = Death'Ĭentred upon the diverging experiences of masculinity across sexuality, race and religion, Barbican's exhibition ' Masculinities: Liberation through Photography' (20th February – 17th May 2020) shines a light on a generation of gay artists who lost their lives during the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.Īlthough we should not wholly define these artists by their sexual orientation or death, here are some of the artists affected by AIDS who widened the possibilities for representing LGBTQ+ identities and perspectives in art.