David Wojnarowicz has fascinated me ever since I picked up Memories That Smell Like Gasoline, an illustrated book he published in 1992. We explored many of the same places in New York City during the previous decade. Parts of it read like my journal. I also read Cynthia Carr's biography which does a deep dive into the art scene on the Lower East Side in the 80s. But neither gave me the full appreciation for his talent that David Wojnarowicz: History Keeps Me Awake at Night, an exhibition that recently closed at the Whitney did.
As far as we've come with marriage equality--a right that may not have thrilled Wojnarowicz, a true sexual outlaw--this cri de couer accompanying his childhood image still rings true. Read it!
It also explains the impetus behind this disturbing self-portrait, directed after his HIV diagnosis.
A slide show does an excellent job of documenting the decaying scene in the West Side Piers, long before many of the artists who used its walls as their canvas migrated into pop-up galleries on the other side of town.
Wojnarowicz photographed many of his friends wearing this Rimbaud mask in different locations around the city.
Jean Genet also influenced him.
Wojnarowicz, impoverished all his life, couldn't afford to be picky about his choice of materials. In addition to the street, he used maps (once as ubiquitous as Google!), newspapers, supermarket posters and garbage can tops. It didn't stifle his creativity a damn bit.
Nor did he ever conceal his sexual orientation. Here's a detail from "Fuck You Faggot Fucker," a 1984 collage.
These plaster heads were among the 23 he decorated and exhibited at Civilian Warfare in 1984.
Nobody silenced Wojnarowicz. You can still hear his rage, almost 30 years after his death.
Wojnarowicz hooked up with photographer Peter Hujar, who soon became his artistic mentor and insisted that he paint.
It's hard not to connect this untitled work to Hujar. AIDS killed both men.
Wojnarowicz's paintings we're unfamiliar to me. As far as I'm concerned, they cement his legacy as an important 20th century artist.
"Wind," part of a series he created about the four elements, includes his only painted self-portrait.
"Water" leaves nothing to the imagination about his sexual orientation.
Some of his work, especially the flower paintings, recalls another renegade, Robert Mapplethorpe, albeit with more pointed messaging.
Wojnarowicz also reminds us there were despicable politicians long before Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell. Here's what Jesse Helms, for example, had to say about people with HIV: "The government should spend less money on people with AIDS because they got sick as a result of deliberate, disgusting, revolting conduct."
If the appreciative crowds at the museum are any indication, Wojnarowicz had the last laugh.
