Summer and Smoke Posted on September 4, 2008 by twiceastammy
Dear Reader,
This is Tammy. Hey look! Summer’s gone up in smoke and it’s back-to-school time. And although my academic pursuits were stopped short many years ago by an ergonomic accident, September still brings with it a pain in my gut. Summer vacation drifts into a landslide of work and anxiety. Will my coworkers laugh at my back-to-school Toughskins and non-name-brand sneakers AGAIN this year? I ignore their petty, school-kid crap and plunge head first into my work. Thankfully, Stein and my boss, curator of media arts Rudolf Frieling, are keeping me busy with a lot of assignments. Stein even proposed I make my little postings here a regular column. (Name options: True Random Thoughts, Non Sequitur, Obvious Observations.) I’ve also been gearing up for the Art of Participation show, opening in November, editing interviews with Alexander Hahn and Yves Netzhammer, and some more mundane projects, like hiding the filing I didn’t do this year and reorganizing the office to confuse Rudolf now that he’s back from vacation. I am seriously busy, but I do have priorities. So, with that in mind, I’ve been checking out the summer shows, and I noticed something peculiar….
Lee Miller is cruisey. Or maybe it’s just the third-floor photography gallery in general. But I’ve been in the exhibition three times now, and each time I happen upon some kind of girl-on-girl sexual tension. Let it be known that my gaydar is technically flawed, but still, if I can identify this ancient ritual, it must be painfully obvious to everyone else. I have some questions about this: Is Lee Miller a gay icon? Or do girls just think she’s hot? Does an artist have to be beautiful or interesting biographically in order to be successful? If so, does this apply more so for women? What would Frida say? Would the cross-dressing, bisexual Frida notice these things too? Would Frida cruise Lee? Would Lee cruise Frida? Could they see past their obvious attraction for each other and just be friends?
