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The art of Jason Driskill

left: Hanging (2004); Judging (2004).

San Francisco artist Jason Driskill paints, writes and creates his own digital artwork and video, often with himself as the main model. This multi-disciplined approach is a rare thing among artists predominantly concerned with gay themes, despite the example set by significant forebears such as Jean Cocteau and Derek Jarman. Driskill’s work also has a sense of humour, something which never seems very popular in the art world unless, perhaps, you’re a Pop Surrealist. Laugh at something in a gallery and it might be felt that you’re laughing at the work, not with it. Or worse, laughing at the price tag, and that would never do, would it? (Thanks Jason!)

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• The gay artists archive

William Rimmer’s Evening Swan Song

Evening: Fall of Day by William Rimmer (1869–70).

This curiously sexless figure is a good example of a work by an artist whose reputation may not have been as elevated as many of his contemporaries but who nonetheless created an image which speaks to future generations. Rimmer (1816–1879) was an American artist who produced a number of pictures along these pre-Symbolist lines. This particular drawing (a blend of crayon, oil and graphite on canvas) became hugely familiar in the Seventies when it was chosen by Led Zeppelin as the basis for their Swan Song label logo (below).

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John Osborne’s Dorian Gray

I wrote recently about John Selwyn Gilbert’s television play, Aubrey, an hour-long drama concerning the artist Aubrey Beardsley. The play was only screened once in 1982 and, like most one-off studio works of the period, is unavailable on DVD. John Osborne’s 1976 adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray is a welcome exception to this neglect and can be acquired in a box set along with three BBC productions of Wilde’s plays and a more recent Wilde documentary.

The stage plays are decent enough although the cast in the 1952 film version of The Importance of Being Earnest takes some beating. Dorian Gray is for me the essential work in the collection, even if its 100-minute running time cuts the story to the bone. The principal attraction in an entirely studio-bound work with few actors is the leads, and for this we have two great performances from John Gielgud as Lord Henry and Jeremy Brett as artist Basil Hallward. The tragic Dorian is played by Peter Firth who has difficulty keeping up with these heavyweights, especially in the later scenes when the story concentrates more fully on his predicament. Matters aren’t helped by his Yorkshire accent which frequently rises to the surface in a manner that would surely raise eyebrows in Mayfair drawing rooms.

Lord Henry & Basil Hallward admire the portrait.

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Library of the lost

Library of the lost
| Iain Sinclair on Wyndham Lewis.

The art of Norbert Bisky

Der jüngste Tag (2004).

At first glance Norbert Bisky‘s paintings aren’t so different from those of other artists with a similar complement of shirtless boys, until you notice curious details such as severed heads and limbs or hanging figures. I’ll be surprised if Dennis Cooper isn’t a fan. The bland style, rendering innocuous what might otherwise be too grotesque, reminds me of Eric Fischl‘s psychosexual explorations of suburban America, which may be an influence. Bukkake Tsunami below is a worthwhile addition to the Art of Ejaculation collection.

left: Gabi (2007); right: Bukkake Tsunami (2007).

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The gay artists archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The art of ejaculation