BGSQD

Readings by Laury Egan and Shelley Marlow--Musical performance by Scott Matthew
2013-02-23 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
Laury A. Egan is the author of a collection, Fog and Other Stories, (May 2012, StoneGarden.net Publishing) and a psychological suspense novel set in Venice, Jenny Kidd (Vagabondage Press), from which she will read. Her two poetry collections, Snow, Shadows, a Stranger and Beneath the Lion’s Paw, were issued by FootHills Publishing. Her work has received nominations for a Pushcart Prize, Best of the Web, Best of the Net, and has appeared in over 35 literary journals. Web site:https://www.lauryaegan.com/

Shelley Marlow is an artist and writer. Marlow’s latest manuscript Two Augusts in a Row in a Row, from which she will read, blends new magic with a story about gender identity, with Phillip, born Philomena, in search of love, in 2001. Marlow’s novella, Lesbians of Arabia, is set in an imagined feminist world, circa 1990.
Marlow’s nonfiction essay, Notes in Kyzyl, about a trip to meet shamans in Siberia, appears in the St. Petersburg Review,https://drupal.stpetersburgreview.com/drupal/?q=issue3. Marlow’s visual art was recently shown at Valentine Gallery, and published in Drunken Boat issue # 16; LTTR journal; The Literary Review; and Zingmagazine.

Scott Matthew
“For some it seems a mistake, for me it’s a way of life.”
It’s a lyric from Aussie-born New Yorker, Scott Matthew’s new album, which also tells the story of Matthews’ own journey. In a nutshell, it’s a life of tragically beautiful music, brimming with longing for a sanctuary; a place to wait for a love that will surely come some day.
For this bearded angel – whom Rolling Stone mag aptly likens to Antony Hegarty and androgynous-era Bowie – writing and recording third solo album, Gallantry’s Favorite Son, was the time “I came to terms with myself”. The result is a more confident, self-assured Matthew tackling issues like bigotry, intolerance and afterlives. With confidence comes joy too, so in first single “The Wonder Of Falling In Love” we find Matthew dancing in a more playful pop playground reminiscent of 2009’s “Thistle.” Together with newie “Felicty,” Matthew weaves connectors between Scott Walker and Devendra Banhart; Council-era Paul Weller and Burt Bacharach’s lush string pop.
But that doesn’t mean the goose bumps have diminished. Matthew’s emotive quiver still “cuts like lovingly administered razors” [Sydney Morning Herald]. In haunting new songs like “Sinking,” “Buried Alive” and “Black Bird,” the man whose worldwide mustering of hearts in queer-comedy-drama Shortbus [director John Cameron Mitchell’s follow-up to Hedwig & The Angry Inch] continues stealing breath. Administering to the listener’s innermost core, he offers an elixir of dark cabaret, restorative folk and gently caressing ballads.
It’s little wonder Rhythms Mag called Matthew’s last album “Mesmerizing,” while “Extremely Beautiful,” “Heartbreaking,” “Brilliant, Stunning, Haunting,” “Hypnotizing… Gorgeous… Heart-melting… Captivating” are just some descriptors proffered in other reviews.
By now it’s clear Matthew’s emotional investment in songs is huge: Matthew and the listener – it’s a heart to heart exchange. This may be more apparent now, than his earlier outings as a Brizzy punk protégé, or in first band Elva Snow with ex-Morrissey man Spencer Cobrin, but as we said at the start, it’s a lifetime’s work, a journey of commitment. “When friendship becomes family, it helps me with the mystery” sings Matthew. His music is like a diary whose secrets are shared with an intimate circle of friends. Welcome to the circle.

Comedians Paul Hallasy, Sandy Ehlers, and Alex Batcha perform at the Bureau
2013-02-22 19:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
Paul Hallasy is a New York City-based comedian, writer, actor and singer. He performs regularly in New York City and has performed at clubs and colleges across the United States and around the world. A favorite of both gay and straight audiences, he was recently named one of “7 Funny LGBT Comics You Shouldn’t Have Missed” by The Advocate and has given gay travel advice to the travel web site Gridskipper. He has also appeared on such TV shows as the Canadian Broadcasting Company’s “Connect with Mark Kelley” and is the author of a book called New York Trilogy.
Sandy Ehlers is brassy, sassy and gassy with an upcoming one-woman show of the same name and just like baseball and Sinatra she hails from the one square mile of Hoboken, NJ. Please give it up for Sandy Ehlers.
Born and raised on a horse farm in New Jersey, or as he calls it, The Italian Section of Kentucky, Alex Batcha brings his unique experiences and point of view to the stage. He can be found performing all over New York City and the tri-state area, and is a regular on weekly radio show Watson and Watson.

Sassafras Lowrey reads from hir novel Roving Pack
2013-02-17 19:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
In conjunction with Samantha Box’s exhibition of photographs of homeless queer youth in NYC, Invisible, Sassafras Lowrey will read from hir novel Roving Pack.
Sassafras Lowrey is an internationally award-winning author, artist, and educator. Sassafras is the editor of the two time American Library Association honored, and Lambda Literary Finalist Kicked Out anthology (www.KickedOutAnthology.com), which brought together the voices of current and former homeless LGBTQ youth. Sassafras’ highly anticipated American Library Association honored debut novel Roving Pack (www.RovingPack.com) was released in autumn 2012. Roving Pack is set in an underground world of homeless queer teens searching for community, identity and connection amidst chaos. Sassafras is also the editor of Leather Ever After an anthology of BDSM fairy tale retellings to be released in early 2013. Sassafras regularly lectures and facilitates LGBTQ storytelling workshops at homeless shelters, colleges, conferences and community groups across the country and believes in the transformative power of storytelling for marginalized queer communities. Sassafras lives in Brooklyn with hir family. To learn more about Sassafras and hir work, visit www.SassafrasLowrey.com
Roving Pack
Called “Political, raucous, dark, and totally engrossing” by Lambda Literary and “a guiding light in the darkness of the false binary illusion of gender we’ve been too lazy to address” by the Huffington Post, Roving Pack, the debut novel by award winning queer author Sassafras Lowrey, is set in an underground world of homeless queer teens. Readers follow the daily life of Click, a straight-edge transgender kid searching for community, identity, and connection amidst chaos. As the stories unfold, we meet a pack of newly sober gender rebels creating art, families and drama in dilapidated punk houses across Portland, Oregon circa 2002. Roving Pack offers fast-paced in-your-face accounts of leather, sex, hormones, house parties, and protests. But, when gender fluidity takes an unexpected turn, the pack is sent reeling.
Kicked Out
In the U.S., 40% of homeless youth identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer(LGBTQ). Kicked Out brings together the voices of current and former homeless LGBTQ youth and tells the forgotten stories of some of our nation’s most vulnerable citizens. Diverse contributors share stories of survival and abuse with poignant accounts of the sanctuary of community and the power of creating chosen families. Kicked Out also highlights the nuanced perspectives of national organizations, regional agencies, This anthology, introduced by Judy Shepard, gives voice to the voiceless and challenges the stereotypical face of homelessness. To learn more, visit us online at KickedOutAnthology.com.

Readings by Sally Bellerose and Hilary Sloin
2013-02-16 07:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
Sally Bellerose is author of The Girls Club, Bywater Books. The manuscript won the Bywater Prize, The Rick Demarinis Award, the Writers at Work Award and an NEA Fellowship. Excerpts have been published in Sinister Wisdom, The Sun, The Best of Writers at Work, Cutthroat, and Quarterly West.
Bellerose’s current project is a short story collection Fishwives which features old women behaving badly. The title story won first place in Saints and Sinners fiction contest.
Bellerose writes about class, sex, illness, absurdity, and lately, growing old.
Also a poet, she loves to mess with rhythm, rhyme, and awkward emotion – in her work.
Please visit her at https://sallybellerose.wordpress.com/

Hilary Sloin began her writing career as a playwright in the 80s. Her plays, which were mostly gay-themed and fairly subversive, were widely produced in the U.S. Lust and Pity was given main stage productions at the Westbank Café in NY, Theatre Rhinoceros in San Francisco, Alice B. Theatre in Seattle, Bailiwick Theatre in Chicago, and others. Other plays were produced in LA and at Smith College and received readings in NY. After a time, she switched to essays and short fiction, publishing in many small journals and anthologies and attending a number of residencies. Art on Fire was her first attempt at a novel and it took a long time to write. It garnered many accolades, including the bizarre honor of being mistakenly awarded prizes for non-fiction; there were those in the industry who wanted to publish it, thinking it was a biography, which, crazy as it is, attests to the success of the book’s intention. Sloin has recently completed a collection of short fiction entitled The Cure for Unhappiness and is currently at work on a manuscript about selling antiques, Pimpin’ the Frontier. When she isn’t writing she is usually refinishing or restoring antiques.

In the Flesh and Visual AIDS present LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN: ROMANCE STARTS AT HOME
2013-02-15 19:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
The thought of Valentine’s Day getting you down? Us too.
Around this season of love, NYC splits into two decisive camps:
1.The candy-lovin’, heart-on-the-sleeve wearin’, de-thorned rose givin’, lacy craft makin torch holders of hetero-romance.
2. The angry, spiteful, lonely, depressed, vengeful cynics who say “Fuck love. pass me that Dario Argento dvd”.
What about the rest of us? Those of us who think love is something worth celebrating, but frankly, don’t want to be icky and boring about it?
This year In the Flesh and Visual AIDS invite you to take part in LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN: Romance Starts at Home. The International Community of Women Living with HIV‘s initiative is a weeklong celebration of positive women where you are encouraged to show your love for positive women, or if you are positive, how you will love yourself better.
On February 15th, In the Flesh’s monthly reading series will be devoted to positive women + allies and their stories on love.
Come join us at The Bureau!

Vladimir Cajkovac on Posters Addressing the AIDS Crisis
2013-02-14 19:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
Vladimir Čajkovac, a curator from Zagreb, Croatia, will speak about his eighteen-month project in Dresden, where he works as a research fellow at the Deutsches Hygiene-Museum on the project AIDS as a Global Media Event: An intercultural comparison of posters and their imagery, culminating in an exhibition and a series of related talks. Čajkovac’s residency in New York for the month of February is co-sponsored by Residency Unlimited and Visual AIDS.
The website of the Deutsches Hygiene-Museum describes the project AIDS as a Global Media Event: An intercultural comparison of posters and their imagery and the related fellowship awarded to Vladimir Čajkovac in the following terms.

AIDS has radically transformed the world and become the focus of interdisciplinary study and research from a medical, cultural and media-historical perspective. Over the past 30 years, the German Hygiene Museum in Dresden has collected numerous items – predominantly posters – which have been used in the media campaign to combat the epidemic. It is the world’s largest collection of AIDS posters with over 9,000 specimens from 100 countries. As important media documents of our times, they convey traditional values and new attitudes concerning safe sex, homosexuality, discrimination, the desire for love, the solidarity with the afflicted and the fear of death. The images and visual composition of the posters offer insights into behavioral patterns, self-images and models of the 21st century, which the fellow from the United States, Eastern Europe or an African country will investigate by means of intercultural image analysis. He or she will be responsible for researching the concrete political, economic, aesthetic and social conditions in which the posters were created, and for interviewing the designers to learn more about the wishes and desires of the target group. Step by step, the fellow will build an international network and create a keyword catalogue which can serve as the basis for further research of the poster collection.

SATANICA Reading
2013-02-13 19:00 - 22:00 | NY
Contributors to SATANICA read at the Bureau. SATANICA is a limited-edition publication curated by Gio Black Peter & Christopher Stoddard for those dedicated to a life of pleasure, excess & self-reflection. Gio Black Peter, Christopher Stoddard, Bruce Benderson, Slava Mogutin, Max Steele, and Micki Pellerano will read.
The 350 copies of SATANICA have sold out, but 25 prints of the cover photograph (above), Gio Black Peter’s Little Tiger on my bed, which is part of the Possession series, will be available exclusively at this event. The photograph is a 5.25″ x 7″ Chromogenic print signed on the back by Gio Black Peter. $150.00 each.

Christopher Stoddard
Christopher Stoddard is the New York-based author of the book, White, Christian (Spuyten Duyvil/Triton Books, 2010), which Bruce Benderson calls a “fascinating novel that intimately depicts the whirling frenzy of a soul with little insight into itself.” In December 2012, he launched the limited-edition magazine Satanica. He has written for Up and Coming, hello mr. and imfromdriftwood.com, and has recently completed his second novel, Limiters, which he plans to submit to publishers in 2013. www.antichrispress.com

Photo: Bertrand Le Pluard, copyright 2013

Bruce Benderson
Bruce Benderson is best known for his seventh book, a memoir called The Romanian: Story of an Obsession (Tarcher/Penguin, 2006), which won France’s prestigious literary award, the Prix de Flore, in French translation. As a journalist he has written for the New York Times Magazine, Paris Vogue, Vogue Hommes, GQ France, Blackbook, Libération and The Village Voice, among others. In the 90s, two books of fiction about urban life, Pretending to Say No and User, were published by Penguin USA to critical acclaim in the U.S. and France. He is a literary translator from the French of works by Grégoire Bouillier, Philippe Djian, David Foenkinos, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Tony Duvert, Virginie Despentes, Nelly Arcan and others. He writes a monthly column for the French magazine Têtu.

Gio Black Peter
Gio Black Peter (Giovanni Andrade Paolo Guevara) is a New York-based performance artist as well as an ardent visual artist. He examines text and subject, truth and fakery, rebellion and authority. His subversive work has quickly earned him a name in the downtown New York scene of young emerging artists who participate in today’s dialogue about the deconstruction of high profile, white box presentation and the desire to raise art awareness. Black Peter has performed and exhibited work worldwide, including: New York, Berlin, Madrid, Milan, Bergen, London, Antwerp, Tokyo and Paris. gioblackpeter.com

Micki Pellerano
Micki Pellerano is a New York-based artist and filmmaker. His films have screened widely across Europe and North America; his drawings and performances have exhibited in New York, Los Angeles, Milan, and Mexico City. Micki received conservatory training at the NYU Tisch School’s Experimental Theater Wing whose teachings continue to influence his work, along with his scholarly accomplishments in the study of esotericism. Publications include The New York Times, Vice Magazine, Zing Magazine, K48, No Milk Today, Useless, Working Class, Dagobert’s Revenge, This is the Salivation Army and Nylon; as well as Disinformation, envoy enterprises, and Printed Matter Anthologies.

Slava Mogutin
Siberian-born artist, writer and activist Slava Mogutin was exiled from Russia at the age of 21 and granted political asylum in the US with the support of Amnesty International and PEN American Center. He is the author of two monographs of photography, Lost Boys and NYC Go-Go, and seven books of writings published in Russian. Mogutin’s photography and multimedia work have been exhibited internationally and featured in a wide range of publications including Flash Art, Modern Painters, i-D, Visionaire, L’Uomo Vogue, L’Officiel Hommes, Stern, and The New York Times. For more info please visit www.slavamogutin.com

Photograph by Amos Mac

Max Steele
Max Steele is a performer and writer. He has presented work at the New Museum, Rapture Cafe, Deitch Projects, Envoy Enterprises, and the Queens Museum of Art. He writes the psychedelic porno poetry zine Scorcher, and is an Artist in Residence at Brooklyn Arts
Exchange. www.fagcity.blogspot.com.
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Queer Lives in Print: A Memoir-writing workshop
2013-02-12 19:00 - 20:30 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
The instructor’s goal is to collect enough pieces over a year or so to include in an anthology to be published be Queer Street Books, Inc. Participants will need to bring pen and paper or an electronic device on which they can write. About the instructor: Hal W. Lanse, PhD is an author, educator and literacy coach. His education book Read Well, Think Well (Adams Media) was hot-listed on Amazon.com. His book The Rainbow Curriculum (Queer Street Books) is designed for educators who want to teach queer history to adolescents. Dr. Lanse will host another session on Tuesdays, February 26.

Up My Spot: Readings by Mia Bruner, Nick Von Kleist, and Zee Whitesides
2013-02-10 19:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
Up My Spot celebrates poetry that queers language, explores modes of representation, and creates sites of non-normative histories, identities, and intimacies. It features three graduating poets from Eugene Lang of The New School, Mia Bruner, Nick Von Kleist, and Zee Whitesides.

Mia Bruner grew up in Los Angeles and moved to New York in 2009 to attend The New School where she co-founded The Akilah Oliver Memorial Reading at Eugene Lang College with Jamila Wimberly. She has worked with the Belladonna* Collaborative, a hub of feminist literary action, since 2009.
NVK grew up in the small town of Phoenix, NY. His work in poetry, performance, and installation aims to conglomerate medieval, rural, academic and grindr cultures into a surreal experience of overarching queerness.

Zee Whitesides is a poet and musician from Radcliffe, Kentucky. Her work aims to recreate languages with new syntaxes and grammars, resist received cultural representations, and rethink how our intimacies are made for us by cultures.
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Opening reception for Invisible, photographs by Samantha Box
2013-02-07 18:00 - 21:00 | NY
SAMANTHA BOX – INVISIBLE
A series of photographs taken between 2005 – 2012, documenting homeless queer and transgender youth in New York City
February 7 – 28, 2013
Opening: Thursday, February 7 from 6-9 PM
Since 2005, Samantha Box has dedicated herself to documenting New York City’s community of homeless lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) youth. Her on-going project, INVISIBLE, has been recognized by the Anthropographia Award for Photography and Human Rights, EN FOCO, and the New York Foundation for the Arts. It has been widely exhibited, most notably, in 2010 at The Sanctuary for Independent Media in Troy, NY, and in 2011 as part of the Open Society Institute’s “Moving Walls #18” exhibition.
“The young people that I photograph are some of the most resilient people that I have ever met: despite facing societal animosity of homo- and transphobia, and the burden of a broken system that conspires to keep them homeless. They continuously work for a future where their talents and intellect can be used, where they have a home, a family and a life of stability.”
– Samantha Box on Time/Lightbox, June 12, 2012

Book Club meets to discuss Valencia
2013-02-05 19:00 - 21:00 | Bureau of General Services–Queer Division, 208 West 13th Street, Room 210, New York, NY, 10011, United States
Book Club is a queer book club that meets every six weeks or so to discuss books. On Tuesday, February 5th, Book Club will meet at the Bureau to discuss Michelle Tea’s Valencia, which is available at the Bureau.

Thursday, January 17, 7 PM: Anthony Thornton and Margaret Glaspy
2013-01-14 08:00 - 17:00 | NY
Anthony Thornton is a New York-based poet, artist and muse. He has been the subject of works by Matthias Hamann and Marco Anelli, appeared in most recent issue of Scott Hug’s K48, and has performed and exhibited at CODEX, Envoy Enterprises and Starr Space. Anthony will read selections from his debut chapbook of poetry Is My Voice Alive?
Born and raised in Northern California, Margaret Glaspy has brought her indescribable voice to the east coast and New York City couldn’t be happier. She is a committed student to the music around her and has been writing some of the most innovative and heartfelt material of her generation. With a list of influences including Omou Sangare, Feist, Jeff Buckley, and Nina Simone, she has created a sound and writing style that is undeniable, honest, and a tribute to the beautiful music that she has discovered throughout her 23 years.
