A year-and-a-half long effort to showcase gay and lesbian artists culminated Friday evening at the Broward County Library main branch with Art Explosion 2001, featuring 55 paintings, photographs and sculptures by 27 local artists.
The inaugural event, sponsored by the non-profit ArtsUnited organization, sought to promote "a positive message about the gay and lesbian community," said co-organizer Chuck Williams.
"We just felt let's not be guilty of forgetting about gay and lesbian artists," Williams said."Let's make art accessible."
Though ArtsUnited was created less than two years, there was a great desire to pull things together quickly, Williams said. And the Friday evening before PrideFest seemed like a good time, he said. ArtsUnited is a non-profit organization founded in 1999. Its creators hope this event and those like it will help break down barriers that have traditionally prevented members of the community from contributing to the arts.
"In viewing art, your sexuality has no relevance to what you're looking at," event Chairman Christopher Yoculan said.
And ArtsUnited enjoyed some great fortune that made getting this event off the ground possible the Broward County Library offered the space, Stork's Cafe donated food and drink and Kicks Sports Bar rought in alcoholic beverages. In addition, John's Fresh Cut Flowers contributed their talents to the event.
In addition, eager students from the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale volunteered their time and energy to design the logo.
Though Williams has been the driving force behind ArtsUnited's creation, he leaned heavily on local artist Yoculan, a former curator in Houston who moved to Fort Lauderdale in January, to help attract other artists. Yoculan "was indispensible," Williams said.
"It's pretty amazing because I just moved here in January and got very involved very quickly," Yoculan said. Not every artist was gay or lesbian, either. But there had to be some tie-in to promoting a positive image of the gay and lesbian community, Yoculan said. Consequently, the male and female forms were featured along with works by openly gay and lesbian artists, he said.
For the participants, it meant more exposure to the community and to prospective buyers, as all pieces were for sale.
"I think this is extremely important for gay and lesbian artists and writers," Fort Lauderdale writer Karen Dale Wolman said. "I've seen more of a coming together by gay and lesbian artists and musicians, but not a lot of gathering places for gay and lesbian writers. This is a place where we can meet," said Wolman, who was signing copies of her first book of fiction, Rites of First Blood, teaches a gay and lesbian fiction course locally.
Fellow writer Edmar Bernardes DaSilva of Oakland Park was also on hand to sign a copy of his third published book of poetry, Feelings and Passions. DaSilva, who said he has written "since I was ten years old," teaches language courses at Academia Linguistica in Oakland Park.
"Events like these are important, but it still takes a lot of self-promotion to be successful," DaSilva said.
The visual arts spanned a broad array of styles and subject matter, from Shirley Tiano's haunting and mesmerizing "Scaffolding at Gdansk" to Gilda Clarice's upbeat watercolors to Joe Futschik's brown, green and black sinewy representations of the male torso. Paintings ranged in price from the hundreds to thousands of dollars.
Perhaps none was more visually striking than the large and striking pop art of Boca Raton resident Allison Lefcourt, whose larger-than-life green, white and black acrylic-on-canvas characterization of pop-art icon Andy Warhol was one of the event's most noticable.
Lefcourt's art has been featured in shows around the country. In addition, she is employed by Walt Disney and Warner Brothers, creating renditions of famous cartoon characters for t-shirts and other gift items.
"Many of the participants became aware of the call for their work through the Gay and Lesbian Community Center of Fort Lauderdale ," Williams said. "ArtsUnited is hoping to plan similar events in the future," he said.
In addition to the featured paintings and photography, Art Explosion included a reading of the original comedic play, LipSync. Two local organizations provided prizes: The Culinary Art Instutute of Fort Lauderdale Chef's Palette provided a dinner for two and Footlights Inc. Theatre Co. provided a framed poster and four tickets to a new play, "As Fate Would Have It."
providing local lesbian and gay artists an interactive and supportive working environment.
