My monthly Gay & Lesbian gallery tours are absolutelycentral to my enterprise.  As it happens, the first gallery tour I ever led—in March 2002—was a gay men’s event.  And my second tour—four weeks later—was for gay men and lesbians.  Surprised?  It turns out that straight people were merely an afterthought in my venture.  And a great afterthought, I must add!  If it weren’t for straights, who now make up two-thirds of my clientele, my business would never have become the success that it is.  But it was members of the LGBT community who helped launch my business, and who remain some of my most loyal and enthusiastic supporters.

Gay artists have always been at the forefront of visual art—think Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and, more recently, Andy Warhol and Robert Rauschenberg.  The only reason that lesbian artists have not reached this level of importance is that, until lately, women as a whole have been shut out from attaining art historical greatness.  The extraordinary lesbian artists of our time—including Catherine Opie, Joan Snyder, Mickalene Thomas, and Louise Fishman—may or may not achieve art pantheon status (it is too early to tell), but eventually lesbian artists certainly will.  And let us acknowledge the exploding ranks of brilliant contemporary gay male artists, among them David Hockney, Jack Pierson, Bjarne Melgaard, and Fred Wilson.  These are all just a tiny handful of the hundreds of gay and lesbian artists whose exhibits we have visited on my LGBT tours, and sometimes on my general public tours as well, over the past eight years.

But there’s a far more personal connection for me between the art world and the gay community.  From age 9 to 17, I was perpetually hounded by taunts of “faggot” (and worse) from within my family, around the neighborhood, and in every school I attended.  Teachers and parents turned a blind eye to the brutality that was going on.  My religion, of course, rejected me completely.  Just because everyone was right about my orientation does not erase the enduring scars from my decade of isolation and stigma.  Unequipped to participate in the college social scene, I remained more or less an outcast during my first two years at Cornell University.

My “awakening” came in my college junior year, when I moved into Cornell’s Risley Hall, a special residence for people who wanted to become involved in the Arts.  It had its own theater, art gallery, night club, and other arts facilities, just like the school in “Fame.”  To my astonishment, I completely fit in.  The place was (naturally) teeming with gay men and lesbians, who gave me the opportunity to explore relationships and sex for the first time.  But even the dorm’s straight residents were pretty much accepting, which back in the late ‘70s went firmly counter to the prevailing attitude, and they enjoyed my company.  I was able to start to develop the social skills that would allow me to function in the world, and I began to thrive.  Artists literally saved this gay boy’s life.

What gays and artists have in common, I grew to realize, is that both groups place great value on non-conformity.  It is the job of the contemporary artist to push the envelope of creativity towards ever more sophisticated (and sometimes uncomfortably extreme) levels of originality and strangeness, thus broadening the perspective of being human.  And it is the life circumstance of the gay man, lesbian, bisexual, and the transgendered to challenge society’s suffocating dictates about marriage, family, relationships and gender roles, and in so doing expand everyone’s social horizons.  Artists and queers are among civilization’s most essential, if sometimes controversial, pioneers.

This natural synergy between the two groups gave me the idea, when I first thought of leading gallery tours, to begin by offering events for gays.  After getting a two-line listing in the now-defunct Homo Extra (HX) Magazine, the first tour went very well, and my gallery tours e-mail list was born.  Over the years, LGBT participants have appreciated not only the opportunity to see and discuss gay & lesbian contributions to art, but also the social perk of meeting others for friendship, dating, and sex, outside the usual bar, club, and internet scene.

Join us for another season of fabulous LGBT experiences!

Rafael Risemberg, Ph.D.
Founder and Director
New York GalleryTours