to age!
Part
I: The
Invisible Closet: on Coming Out as a Photographer.
Part II: The 1970s Revisited
Biron on Robert Opel, Camille
O'Grady, Jerry Dreva, Robert Mapplethorpe, Gronk, Teddy, Jorge Caraballo,
Clemente Padin, Guglielmo Achille Cavellini, and other Mail Artists
Interview by Philip Vincent
Biron
moved to San Francisco on May 23, 1978 from Ann Arbor, Michigan where in
the early '70s he had Come Out, and founded with a few other graduate students
the first Teaching Fellows' union at the University of Michigan. He soon
thereafter abandoned a Ph.D. dissertation on the Dada Poetry and Philosophy
of Tristan Tzara.
-
- During this time, he amassed a collection
of Tzara books and Dada artifacts which were exhibited at several universities
and museums including the University of Michigan (1975), the University
of California at Berkeley (1980), and the Taipei Fine Arts Museum (1988).
The collection was eventually sold, some major works purchased by the Getty
Museum. While
in Ann Arbor, he was active in the Gay Liberation Front, Gay Academic Union,was
a trained peer-counselor with the Gay Hotline, and helped organize and
manage the Gay Community Services a non-profit drop-in social and
counseling center that served the University of Michigan gay community.
-
- In 1977, Biron compiled and edited the
Lesbian and Gay Male Directory and The Youth Survival Guide
(with several Gay referrals) distributed free to all of Ann Arbor's public
high school students in the Fall of that year. In addition, he published
over a dozen gay articles including "The Advocate: Capitalist Manifesto"
a scathing critique of
ADVOCATE publisher David Goodstein's Gay agenda that appeared in GAY SUNSHINE
(San Francisco, Spring 1976).
-
- From early experiments with Xerox art
in the mid '60s, Biron participated in various conceptual and mail art
projects in the mid `70s. The month after his arrival in San Francisco,
he exhibited in the Lesbian/Gay Pride group art show, curated by Lee Mentley,
at the Gay Community Center's TOP FLOOR GALLERY located at 330 Grove Street,
an old big rickety warehouse that has since been replaced by a solid concrete
municipal parking structure.
-
- That summer, Biron worked for the 'NO
on 6' Campaign distributing fund-raising buttons to gay bars in the SOMA.
He also created his Art Attack piece at the San Francisco Art Institute
and his Hastings Man billboard zap at the corner of Hyde and Bush which
Robert Opel photo documented. Biron was a regular at the openings of Opel's
FEY WAY STUDIOS (March 1978-July 1979) an art gallery that featured
leather male erotica.
WHAT WAS YOUR ASSOCIATION WITH ROBERT
OPEL?
LB: Robert Opel was a collaborator. When
I moved to San Francisco in May of 1978, I was still active in the underground
mail art community and exhibited some of my photocopies in a group show
at THE TOP GALLERY in the Gay Community Center during the Lesbian/Gay Pride
Celebrations that year. It was a great feeling to unpack the car, and have
someplace to immediately display my work. It was also my first gay exhibition.
Robert showed an interest and in September
participated in my Great Crime Contest. He then documented my Hastings billboard
piece with his photographs in March of 1979.
That same month I participated in the
First Anniversary Show at his art gallery, FEY WAY STUDIOS. I exhibited
only one piece a photo-collage based on a 10 year old Polaroid self-portrait.
Like most things exhibited at Fey Wey, it didn't sell. No one expected things
to sell. Everybody was having too much fun to care about that.
Robert was also a personal friend and
we occasionally hung around together. Never with anybody else. I never was
part of any group that hung around at Fey-Way. I was not much into leathermyself,
but I often hung out in the SOMA gay leather bars if I wasn't on Polk Street.
Yhe Castro, in my early years in San Francisco, was of no interest to me.
When the HOT HOUSE first opened its doors
on Fifth Street and they threw this wild weekend long party, and Robert
Opel shared his invitation with me. There was something very generous and
open about Robert. Although he was dfinitely judgmental about the state
of political affairs, I never felt he was judgmental about his friends.
THE HOT HOUSE that week-end was like a leather fantasy theme park with no
closing hours. We went in Friday evening and left Sunday morning.
WHAT WAS FEY WAY STUDIOS LIKE?
LB: With Robert Opel as its director,
it was an incredible place. First, it was located at 1287 Howard Street
in SOMA just half a block down the street from the notorious BLACK AND BLUE
bar and the 8TH STREET BATHS two institutions that attracted
gay men to the area in droves and who would sidetrack to the gallery on
opening nights. But when I said 'director' I was being sarcastic. Robert
was more like a circus ringmaster who keeps things moving with one act after
aother. He had a lot of energy, a good heart, and to boot was quite handsome.
I miss those opening nights. The receptions
were always fun and a good place to meet interesting people. Robert showed
the works of Tom of Finland, Étienne, Lou Rudolph, Rex, Chuck Arnett,
Domino, Charlie Airwaves, Rick Borg, Mark Kadota, Olaf, and The Hun, and
other artists all barely recognized as artists in those days even
within the broader Gay community.
My friend Greg Day was a regular and Rink
was there as he was every place else I suppose documenting for posterity.
One of Rink's FEY WAY photos was recently published in a biography of Robert
Mapplethorpe.
I think Fey-Way was either the first or
second time Mapplethorpe's photographs were exhibited in San Francisco,
and to be quite honest, no one paid much attention since his work was double
billed with drawings by the already quite popular Tom, of 'Tom of Finland'
fame.
The SOMA leather community was definitely
at the cutting edge. Gay artists were regularly exhibited in bars like THE
AMBUSH, but it was Robert Opel who created the first Gay art gallery in
San Francisco that openly celebrated male erotica. Especially hard-core
stuff.
In addition, FEY WAY was a performance
space open to anything queer from the rock poetry of Ruby Zebra to the showing
of experimental films directed by Robert and Bill Moritz.
And there was, as the poster proclaimed,
the first West Coast performance direct from New York's MINE SHAFT
of Camille O'Grady. Camille was an extraordinary artist, an attractive
leather woman who when she lived with Robert did a fantastic drawing of
him dressed in leather with these large angelic wings that was used to publicize
FEY WAY's first anniversary show. It was gay SOMA's golden age!
WHAT WAS THE IMPACT OF ROBERT OPEL'S
DEATH?
LB: It was tremendous. Robert's murder
in July 1979 was a great personal loss and totally unexpected. As I said,
he was a friend and a sympathetic collaborator who understood the essentially
political nature of art. This was before AIDS, so I wasn't accustomed to
a young friend dying especially in a brutal murder. It stopped me
dead in my tracks as far as my art projects were concerned. That was the
end of my mail art stuff and my art attacks. It had been great fun, and
I just didn't feel like playing anymore.
His death was catastrophic for the Gay community as well. Robert's charisma
was the nucleus around which a hard core of high energy artists gathered.
Think of it as a Gay beehive with Robert as the Queen bee.
We were all dazed by the brutal murder
as we went own separate ways. There was some talk of keeping the gallery
open only talk.
After FEY WAY STUDIOS closed, the bars
went up across the windows and THE BALLOON LADY eventually moved in.
Of course, Robert will be best remembered for having streaked the 1974 Academy
Awards on live TV when David Niven was at the podium. I'd rather remember
him for his Anita Bryant Look-Alike Contest or his his last major project
his Dan White mock execution which was as controversial a piece
of theater within the Gay community as was Robert himself. Unfortunately,
he was the one executed: tied up in his studio and shot in the head
all for $5.
Coming Out takes on a whole different
meaning when I think of Robert Opel. Uncompromising and unapologetic, he
blurred the lines between art and life as he traveled beyond the confines
of accepted behavior. Harvey Milk and then Robert Opel both killed within
a few months. As Dylan said: the times they were a changing.
WHEN DID YOU GET STARTED WITH MAIL
ART?
LB: When I shared an apartment in Ann
Arbor with Tom Dorrien who published the mail artzine CHEAP TRASH. Actually,
I got him interested. I was already doing conceptual pieces like the first
Joint-Assisted Ready-Made with Andy Warhol in 1975.
Nothing serious, I was no Ray Johnson.
I was just having fun with a bunch of "pen pals" across the United
States and Europe who exchanged art through the mail. Then, I met others
in Ann Arbor like Warhol who was on tour promoting his autobiography. That's
what attracted me to it, people having a good time, not taking their work
too seriously, yet still functioning as serious artists. That may sound
contradictory; it really isn't.
WITH WHOM DID YOU COLLABORATE?
LB: I was in contact with artists like
R. Mutt, Opal L. Nations, S HITchcock, Cavellini, John Bennett, Tinkerbelle,
Diana Peipol, Jerry Dreva, and in L.A., Gronk and Teddy.
The 1970s was a very creative period.
There were all kinds of exchanges: letters, cards, collages, stamps, photocopy
and rubber stamp stuff, slogans, contests, and zines. Great fun!
For example, Jerry Dreva's August 13,
1978 guerrilla performance in South Milwaukee borrowed my slogan: "Art
only exists beyond the confines of accepted behavior" from The Great
'78 Mail Art Crime Contest and incorporated it into his own art project
that was featured in the Spring 1980 issue of L.A.'s HIGH PERFORMANCE.
Jerry duplicated my Heart Attack piece
using the stencils I had mailed to him in South Milwaukee. He documented
this piece with photographs, an illustrated article from the local press,
and a copy of the official South Milwaukee police report. As a payoff, he
sent me a full set of the documentation. That's how it went: organic collaborations.
You took an idea it didn't have to be your own and ran
with it.
In March 1978, Dreva came to L. A. for
a major show with Gronk at the Contemporary Exhibitions, at 240 South Broadway:
"Dreva/Gronk 1968-78 TEN YEARS OF ART/LIFE."
I still have a "Dreva/Gronk 68-78"
commemorative button created for that exhibition. In exchange for something
I mailed out, Gronk sent me folded neatly in an envelope an
extremely fine pen and ink figure drawing on a plain white cotton handkerchief.
Now, nearly twenty years later, these Gronk handkerchiefs are sold in art
galleries for $1,000 each. The Mexican Museum at Fort Mason had an excellent
20 year retrospective of Gronk's work just a few years ago.
WAS THE MAIL ART MOVEMENT GAY?
LB: Have you ever heard of one that wasn't?
Of course, it wasn't exclusively Gay,
if that's what you mean. There were certainly other Gay mail artists around.
I didn't know any Lesbians although I had contacts with female artists like
Diane Peipol, a friend in Ann Arbor who eventually moved to Chicago where
she made a name for herself. In the circles I was involved in, there was
plenty of Gay energy.
Yet, I don't recall that gayness was ever
a topic of discussion. Certain projects were obviously intended to exclude
the homophobes, and I'm fairly positive we succeeded in doing that. However,
I don't recall any collaboration which clearly drew the line between gay
and straight. But my Hastings Man billboard could not be misconstrued in this regard.
Teddy, a Chicano performance and Xerox artist based in L.A., was the most
Out within the Mail Art movement that I knew. One year I received this marvelous
colored Xerox Valentine of himself in full drag.
A group of L.A. Chicano artists who banded
together as the BUTCH GARDENS SCHOOL OF ART presented in 1979 "La Historia
de Frida Kahlo" in which Gronk performed a musical number and danced
with Teddy dressed in drag with high heels and strapless gown.
The publicity flyer showed a picture of
Frida Kahlo's across which was rubber stamped my slogan: "Art only
exists beyond the confines of accepted behavior" which in a more esoteric
interpretations was suggesting the need for significant political action
such as Coming Out.
The slogan was picked up by many artists
not all of whom were Gay who saw its more obvious meaning as being directed
against conformity within the art community. As you know much of what is
sold as hip contemporary art
The BUTCH GARDENS SCHOOL OF ART also included
Eddie Dominquez, Harry Gamboa, Gilde Montez, S. Zaneta, Kosiba, and Vargas
whose activities and sexual proclivities I know nothing about but here are
their names on this program I found
in my files.
It amazes me now how speculating about people's sexual tendencies was of
little interest to me in mail art when it so important in other contexts.
It's probably because we Gays clearly made our presence felt. We never experienced
discrimination from within the movement that would have required us to band
together. The fact we had no need to protest suggests that the mail art
movement was pretty cool and laid back in the `70s.
WHAT ABOUT ROBERT Mapplethorpe?
LB: Not much to report. I know he was
at least marginally involved with the movement. My only contact with Robert
Mapelthorpe was with the Great Crime Contest.
WHAT WAS MAPLETHORPE'S PARTICIPATION IN
THIS CRIME CONTEST?
LB: The Great Crime Contest took place
in September 1978 and involved 100 artists from throughout the United States.
Aside from that, there's little I can add because the contest's rules stipulated
that in order to protect the participants, no documentation would be published
or otherwise released.
I've never discussed the contest and if
any information on it ever comes out, it won't be from me. The crime contest
is part of Mail Art's underground, its unwritten history that belongs exclusively
to its participants and is the movement's only protection against total
exploitation from without. This sort of thing has nothing to do with creating
an elitist mystique and everything to do with keeping the energy alive much
like Marcel Duchamps' thundering silence did for Dada.
IS MAIL ART ANARCHISTIC?
LB: Sometimes, but the premise on which
it rests is the old Dada maxim: Art = Life. So,
Neo-Dada Mail Art is fundamentally conceptual.
Dada and Futurism are the direct sources
for much of today's so-called avant garde: all those performance and conceptual
artists.
The Dadaist were primo intellectuals who
focused on the creative process the spirit with which one does
things rather than on the artistic product the tangible goods such
as drawings, a paintings, sculptures what people usually associate
with art. Consequently, Dada's affinities are more spiritual than materialistic.
Since Mail Art, like Dada, involved consciousness raising, it could, at
times, be quite political. For example, in 1978, Geoffrey Cook organized
an international letter writing campaign from San Francisco that lead to
the release of Jorge Caraballo and Clemente Padin two prominent Uruguayan
mail artists who were missing and unaccounted for in Uruguay for nearly
a year.
Senator Cranston followed up on the request
and in a letter to me dated October 31, 1978, reported that investigations
conducted by the U.S. State Department in Montevideo confirmed that Caraballo
had just been released on bail and Padin's release was imminent. Our mail
art blitz had worked.
HAVE YOU MAINTAINED YOUR MAIL ART CONTACTS?
LB: It all depends on how you spell it.
[Laughs] Actually, I've had nothing to do with correspondence art, mail
art, since Robert Opel died in 1979. However, I did attend the SAN FRANCISCO
INTER-DADA 1984 FESTIVAL, sponsored by the Canadian Consulate and the Goethe
Institute, which featured a series of well organized events including a
Mail Art show, a Dada Parade in SOMA, a reading of Tzara's poetry and manifestos
at Hotel Utah, a dance contest and a fashion show at the Victoria Theater,
and a series of lectures, and a Midnight Scream at the Emeryville Mud flats.
The Festival allegedly done in the spirit
of Dada was too focused on the past and had little new or interesting to
offer. It served as a showcase for some of the old-bananas preoccupied with
their historical lineage to Dada and all that. Old Dada, not Neo-Dada. I
suppose I could be accused of doing just that right now. So rather than
reading about all this why don't you go out and do something instead.
Anyway, the serious linear tone of the
festival made attempts at spoofing fall flat. And the participants were
a little too straight for my own taste straight machismo and
hetero-coupling, a combination I particularly find repugnant.
So it was more of a conference than a
festival with a liot of pseudo-intellectual overtones. What can you expect
when the Goethe Institute is sponsoring slide shows and German avant-garde
films that promote the Motherland's contributions to Dada.
It proved to be great aversion therapy
for I haven't been interested since. So now you know how I got cured of
the illness known as Mail Art.
IF MAIL ART IS IN THE PAST, WHY DO
YOU WANT TO DISCUSS IT NOW?
LB: That's a good question. First, it's
important for Gays to know how in all ways even minor ones like this
we Gays have been influential and have made a difference.
Another reason is that I've had more time
to organize my papers and be more introspective since I've been unemployed
for some time now. And, after nearly 20 years, perhaps it's a story finally
worth telling.
WILL MAIL ART SURVIVE?
LB: If it's not already dead, sure why
not? But who cares? Mail Art is or was about having fun and has involved
all kinds of people. It's democratic and open minded.
Back in the late '70s, they estimated
that some 10,000 to 20,000 people had already participated in the Mail Art
movement since 1962 when Ray Johnson created the New York Correspondence
School.
I want to clear something up. I did not personally have any contact with
many of the major players like George Brecht, Ray Johnson, Joseph Beuys,
Yoko Ono, George Maciunas, and Dick Higgins. However, I knew more or less
what they were doing. However, I did collaborate with Cavellini in Italy
quite extensively.
WHO WAS CAVELLINI?
LB: Gueglielmo Achille Cavellini was a
master showman, the Sol Hurok of Mail Art, who just happened to own a chain
of supermarkets in Italy. So, Cavellini had lots of money to pursue his
projects.
In the '70s, he produced some of the slickest
stamps and some of the best internationally collaborative mail art exhibitions
and catalogues in which I participated. He spared no money in his playful,
well orchestrated quest for fame.
Cavellini masterminded the worldwide distribution
of tens of thousands of brightly printed round plastic stickers advertising
his Centennial Exhibition at the Ducal Palace in Venice from September 7
through October 27, 2014. These stickers are still occasionally posted around
in the upper Haight. The opening night reception at the Ducal Palace less
than 18 years away is one party I'd like not to miss.
END OF PART II
Part II : The 1970s Revisited: Biron
on Robert Opel, Camille O'Grady, Jerry Dreva, Robert Mapplethorpe, Gronk,
Teddy, Jorge
Caraballo, Clemente Padin, Cavellini, and other Mail Artists. Lionel A. Biron 1996 © All Rights
Reserved.
Part I: The Invisible
Closet: on Coming Out as a Photographer.
Home 
page!