“One day this kid will get larger,” begins the text on David Wojnarowicz’s well-known Untitled (One Day This Kid…), which came into larger public consciousness as a benefit print for the anti-bullying It Gets Better Project. With a central photograph of Wojnarowicz as a child surrounded by text, the piece documents the physical and emotional violence … Continue reading
“Kathy Acker’s drunken girls, she meant us, that’s the way she read to us…” –Pam Brown “1995” “At a certain point, I realized the ‘I’ doesn’t exist. So I said to myself: if the ‘I’ doesn’t exist, I have to construct one, or maybe even more than one,” remarked experimental fiction icon and Filthy Dreams … Continue reading
I have a confession to make, dearest Filthy Dreams readers, I’m fascinated with Milo Yiannopoulos. I know, I know, I know–you don’t have to tell me how I should ignore him outright. And it’s been much easier to ignore the conservative provocateur and his attention-seeking tactics after his career fell into an immediate and dizzying … Continue reading
Amanda Lepore isn’t afraid of exposing herself. Whether showing up to chic events near or completely naked or purring over club hits like “Champagne” (“I drink champagne in the morning/I drink champagne in the afternoon”) and “My Pussy” (“My pussy is famous/My pussy is expensive”) with Larry Tee, Lepore puts herself (and her pussy) out there. … Continue reading
If Cosey Fanni Tutti’s life and work could be summed up in a quick sound byte, it would be, “My Life Is My Art. My Art Is My Life” (115). From her performance art and musical work in COUM Transmissions, Throbbing Gristle, Chris & Cosey, and Carter Tutti to her solo performance work and her … Continue reading
Ariel Goldberg’s The Estrangement Principle–a roving, multi-year investigation into the labels “queer art” and, to a lesser extent, “queer literature”–could not come at a better time. I don’t know about you, dearest Filthy Dreams readers, but have you noticed that it’s become a little queerer recently? At least to me, it seems like the term … Continue reading
I’ve never contemplated jumping out a window while clutching an over 800 page book before reading Hanya Yanagihara’s distressing, bleaker than bleak novel A Little Life. Published in 2015, Yanagihara describes the writing of her book as “a fever dream.” And well, it’s not that much different to read–a bildungsroman filtered through extreme, seemingly unending … Continue reading
In Divine’s classic hit song “Born To Be Cheap,” that bewigged bastion of filth snarls, “As sure as there’s trash, I was born to be cheap!” Not only a rallying cry for gaudy girls everywhere, Divine also hits on an important factoid: Trash is forever. Not just those bags of garbage dumped at the side … Continue reading
Home can reveal so much about a person. Yes, this is an obvious cliché, but an individual’s architectural and interior design sensibilities–not to mention their cornucopia of tacky knick-knacks scattered around their existence–speaks volumes. This truism relates perhaps even more to queer individuals. Since, at the very least, the Decadents at the turn of the … Continue reading
As a connoisseur and supporter of nightlife as an important domain for activism and art in the face of judgments of its superficiality and frivolity, I naturally jumped at the chance to dive into Tim Lawrence’s recently published study of New York nightlife Life and Death on the New York Dance Floor, 1980-1983. At 600 pages, … Continue reading