Jonathan Katz

A groundbreaking, global survey of queer art, featuring more than 300 artworks made following the introduction of the term ‘homosexual’ in 1869 An unprecedented and historic new book, The First Homosexuals traces the evolution of the homosexual identity through an archive of more than 300 paintings, drawings, sculptures, prints, photographs, and film stills from around the world – many presented in a queer, global, and colonial context for the first time. Accompanying the works are twenty-two original, insightful essays by leading experts in art and queer history, each focusing on one geographical region – from Japan to Australia to the Indigenous populations of South America. Ranging from well-known masterpieces to works by unknown artists and pieces rarely considered in the context of sexuality, The First Homosexuals offers a stunning and illuminating look at the first self-consciously queer art. The book accompanies a groundbreaking exhibition of the same name presented at Wrightwood 659 in Chicago. Featured artists include Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Thomas Eakins, John Singer Sargent, Félix Vallotton, Harriet Hosmer, Katsushika Hokusai, Kitagawa Utamaro, Frederic Leighton, Simeon Solomon, Giovanni Boldini, Jacques-Émile Blanche, Berenice Abbott, Clare Atwood, Duncan Grant, Laura Rodig, Carl van Vechten, Beauford Delaney, Anna Klumpke, Sarah Bernhardt, Walter Sickert, Florence Carlyle, Florence Wyle , Frances Loring, Ottilie Roederstein, Florine Stettheimer Nasta Rojc, Glyn Philpot, Romaine Brooks, Ismael Nery, Manuel Rodríguez Lozano, Roberto Montenegro, María Izquierdo, Emilio Baz Viaud, Konstantin Somov, Pascal Adolphe Jean Dagnan-Bouveret, Alice Austen, Emilie Mundt, Bertha Wegmann, Thomas Anshutz, Marsden Hartley, Charles Demuth, Marie Laurencin, Gerda Wegener, Lili Elbe, Gregorio Prieto, Jorge Larco, Pavel Tchelitchew, Andrey Avinoff, Gustave Courtois, Carlos Baca-Flor, Gustave Moreau, Henry Scott Tuke, Sascha Schneider, Ludwig von Hofmann, Max Oppenheimer, Eug?ne Jansson, Osmar Schindler, George Platt Lynes, Agnes Goodsir, Tamara de Lempicka, Pedro Lira, Wilhelm von Gloeden, Ladislav Mednyánszky, F. Holland Day, Kristian Zahrtmann, Violet Oakley, Rupert Bunny, Saturnino Herrán, David Paynter, Lionel Wendt, Richmond Barthé, Richard Bruce Nugent, Lady Una Troubridge, Jean Cocteau, Léon Bakst, Lumiere Brothers, Marie Höeg & Bolette Berg, José Guadalupe Posada, Claude Cahun, Toyen, Toni Ebel, and Elisar von Kupffer (Elisarion).

The long-awaited first career survey from photographer Amos Badertscher, who comprehensively documented a uniquely American queer underworld Across several decades, self-taught photographer Amos Badertscher (1936-2023) made thousands of photographs of a liminal queer world: young male sex workers, drag performers, trans pioneers, and Baltimore, Maryland's inclusive, ribald nightlife. The encounters with these marginalized figures helped Badertscher understand his own queer identity and reveal a confident body of work that stakes out an important corner of queer art and aesthetics. Made between the 1960s and early 2000s, the photographs featured here constitute an unparalleled chronicle of a culture of the era particular not only to Badertscher's hometown, but universally identifiable, one which began to fade with the movement of LGBTQ+ rights and liberation. The hundreds of images are accompanied by Badertscher's writings about the history and experiences of his subjects, further illuminating the intimate inner lives of people who were frequently dismissed, feared, and objectified by mainstream culture. Amos Badertscher Images and Stories is a landmark introduction to a figure who is now finally receiving his due as a major twentieth-century portraitist and chronicler of queer subculture.

A unique survey of 350 artworks by a global and diverse array of LGBTQ+ artists – many underrecognized and overlooked – from the last 50 years Though the Stonewall Riots might now be shorthand for the start of the gay rights movement, so much of art and culture has been 'queer' since the beginning of time. In About Face, art historian and curator Jonathan D. Katz explores this concept head-on, curating a tapestry of works that connect historical threads and reveal how gender and sexual identity have been interwoven by artists contemporaneous to and since Stonewall. With more than 350 artworks by over 40 LGBTQ+ artists across nationalities and generations, and original texts by artists and scholars, About Face is as stunning as it is important.