BGSQD

Queer Mental Health, Queer Clinical Theory: a Conversation
2019-04-26 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | NY
Join authors Esther Rapoport, PsyD, Stephanie Schroeder, JD, and Teresa Theophano, LCSW for a discussion of LGBTQ mental health and their respective newly published books.

Dr. Rapoport is the author of From Psychoanalytic Bisexuality to Bisexual Psychoanalysis: Desiring in the Real (Routledge, June 2019). Bisexuality was one of the foundational concepts of Freud’s theory – but unlike his other foundational concepts related to gender and sexuality, and despite the increasing visibility of bisexual lifestyles in contemporary society, it has received little critical attention within the psychoanalytic community. From Psychoanalytic Bisexuality to Bisexual Psychoanalysis is the first book to assess bisexuality through a range of psychoanalytic and critical (feminist and queer) perspectives, highlighting both the issues faced by bisexual people in contemporary society and the challenges that can be presented by bisexual clients within a clinical setting. In her talk, Esther Rapoport will critique the logical errors inherent to, and the ideological underpinnings of, the Freudian concept of bisexuality, and outline the development (or lack thereof) of this concept in post-Freudian psychoanalysis. She will then offer some alternative ways to conceptualize bisexual subjectivities through the lenses of contemporary psychoanalytic theories. Clinical vignettes will be used to explore the issue of widespread negative countertransference responses in the clinical setting and to comment on the social pressures facing bisexuals of various genders, and the resultant psychological effects.

Schroeder and Theophano’s Headcase: LGBTQ Writers and Artists on Mental Health and Wellness (Oxford University Press, February 2019) is a groundbreaking anthology comprised of creative nonfiction, visual art, poetry, and more from the points of view of queer and trans people with lived experience of health care–some peers, some providers, and some who fall into both categories. Schroeder, a peer counselor and independent LGBTQ mental health advocate and Theophano, a licensed social worker and community organizer–both of them writers and editors with previously published LGBTQ books and essays–will discuss their work with and long-term involvement in NYC’s queer and trans communities. They will read from their own contributions to Headcase and foster a discussion of approaches to queer mental health.

Copies of Headcase: LGBTQ Writers and Artists on Mental Health and Wellness are available for purchase at the Bureau. (Esther Rapoport’s From Psychoanalytic Bisexuality to Bisexual Psychoanalysis will be published by Routledge in June 2019). To reserve a copy of Headcase for purchase at the event, please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by purchasing books from us. Thank you for your support!

Stephanie Schroeder is a freelance writer and grassroots mental health activist in NYC. Also a certified peer specialist, she works with women ages 45+ who are homeless and living with mental health issues. Stephanie’s writing has been widely anthologized and she is the author of the memoir Beautiful Wreck: Sex, Lies & Suicide (Creative Evolution, 2012). See her website for more info: www.stephanieschroederauthor.com

Teresa Theophano, LCSW, is a social work supervisor and freelance writer/editor who works full-time at an LGBT nonprofit serving older adults. Teresa has contributed to numerous anthologies and websites in addition to authoring Queer Quotes (Beacon Press, 2004). She co-founded the NYC Queer Mental Health Initiative in 2014, has taught as an adjunct professor at CUNY, and currently serves on the board of directors of the NYC-based queer homeless youth program Trinity Place Shelter.

Esther Rapoport, Psy.D is a clinical psychologist and psychoanalytic candidate practicing in Tel Aviv. She has worked extensively with queer, bisexual and trans clients, and frequently lectures on clinical work with people from these communities in various mental health, academic and community settings in Israel. From Psychoanalytic Bisexuality to Bisexual Psychoanalysis is her first book; her prior work was published in psychoanalytic journals and edited volumes as well as the Journal of Bisexuality and the anthology Bisexuality and Queer Theory: Intersections, Connections and Challenges (Lambda Award finalist for 2012). She is a political activist with the Israeli groups Coalition of Women for Peace and Psychoactive – Mental Health Professionals for Human Rights.

Todd Sweeney: The Fiend of Fleet High - David Pratt Reads
2019-04-25 19:00 - 20:00 | NY
David Pratt reads from his wild, wicked and wonderful Todd Sweeney: The Fiend of Fleet High, a hilariously touching and instructive update of the bloody marvelous penny dreadfuls of old, the seamy, overheated, heart-tugging genre that gave us Sweeney Todd. This new Todd is a bi guy who, with his girlfriend, Nellie, is out to save his gay pal, Toby, from the horrors of conversion camp. Will Todd succeed? What do the cops know? Will they figure out Nellie’s creative way of making evidence disappear? Read Todd Sweeney and find out. And be sure to suck up the juices!

Copies of Todd Sweeney: The Fiend of Fleet High are available for purchase at the Bureau. To reserve a copy please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!

David Pratt is the author of Bob the Book (Lambda Literary Award winner), My Movie, Looking After Joey and Wallaçonia.

Publishing Triangle Awards Finalists Reading 2019
2019-04-24 19:00 - 21:00 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Join twelve of the best LGBT writers of 2018 on Wednesday, April 24, at 7 PM, at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division as they read from their work, all of which are finalists for the prestigious Publishing Triangle and Ferro-Grumley awards to be announced on Thursday, April 25, at the Publishing Triangle Awards Ceremony & Reception, at The New School, 66 West 12th Street, in Greenwich Village, New York.
Copies of the nominated books are available for purchase at the Bureau. To reserve a copy of one or more of the books please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!
Featuring the authors of the following nominated books:

Autobiography of a Wound, by Brynne Rebele-Henry (University of Pittsburgh Press)

Drapetomania, by John Gordon (Team Angelica).

Eden, by Andrea Kleine (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

‘
Forgive the Body This Failure, by Blas Falconer (Four Way Books)

High Ground Coward, by Alicia Mountain (University of Iowa Press)

How to Write an Autobiographical Novel, by Alexander Chee (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

The Lesbian South: Southern Feminists, the Women in Print Movement, and the Queer Literary Canon, by Jaime Harker (University of North Carolina Press)

Mosaic of the Dark, by Lisa Dordal (Black Lawrence Press)

Rest, by Margaree Little (Four Way Books)

The Soul of the Stranger, by Joy Ladin (Brandeis University Press)

That Was Something, by Dan Callahan (Squares and Rebels)

Tinderbox: The Untold Story of the Up Stairs Lounge Fire and the Rise of Gay Liberation, by Robert W. Fieseler (Liveright/W. W. Norton)

Bespoke Spring '19 Edition: April is the Coolest Month!
2019-04-23 19:00 - 21:00 | NY
BESPOKE: It’s April! The cruelest month? Make that the COOLEST month! Join us for the resurrection of our most garish garments and frighteningly fashionable attire as Tuesday April 23 the Bureau features Jericho Brown, Mariah MacCarthy, and Dima Mikhayel Matta at Bespoke, a bimonthly queer series where featured readers dress fun, fancy, or flirtatious. This sinfully sartorial series presents fashionable femmes, dapper dykes, chic twinks, trendy trans* folk, & frothy FTMs. Featured writers are encouraged to suit up or dress down: readers’ choice.

Open mic readers (2 minutes each): whose name shall be drawn from the rainbow top hat this month? General attendees: which incredible edibles from Dylan’s Candy Bar will find their way to the insatiate maws of our deviant demimonde?

Your Bespoke hosts are Christina Quintana “CQ” (writer/ playwright/ dyke about town), Tim Murphy (longtime LGBTQ journalist, activist and author of the novels Christodora and Correspondents) and Jerome Ellison Murphy (poet, critic and NYU Creative Writing Program administrator). This twinkling trio invites you to turn out in your Tuesday best (dressing up is welcome & encouraged, not mandatory) every other month for drinks and chat before & after our reading.

Suggested donation of $10 to benefit the Bureau. No one turned away for lack of funds.

Jericho Brown is the recipient of a Whiting Writers’ Award and fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Brown’s first book, Please (2008), won the American Book Award. His second book, The New Testament (2014), won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was named one of the best of the year by Library Journal, Coldfront, and the Academy of American Poets. He is also the author of the collection The Tradition (2019). His poems have appeared in Buzzfeed, The Nation, The New York Times, The New Yorker, The New Republic, Time, and The Pushcart Prize Anthology, and several volumes of The Best American Poetry anthologies. He is an associate professor and the director of the Creative Writing Program at Emory University in Atlanta.

Mariah MacCarthy is a nonbinary creatrix and an award-winning writer, performer, and birth mother. They’ve written for BuzzFeed, Yes! magazine, LOOK magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, and others. Their plays have been performed all over the world, and the New York Times called their immersive party play Mrs. Mayfield’s Fifth-Grade Class of ’93 20-Year Reunion “a lot of fun.” They live in Astoria with their cat, Sophie. Squad is their first novel.

Dima Mikhayel Matta is a Beirut-based university instructor of English and Creative Writing at the University of Balamand, a writer, and an actress. She received a Fulbright scholarship and completed her MFA in creative writing at Rutgers University in 2013. She has been acting for the stage since 2006 and has worked with directors such as Lina Abyad, Sahar Assaf, and Aliyah Khalidi. In 2014, she founded Cliffhangers, the first bilingual storytelling platform in Lebanon, and hosts monthly storytelling events along with parallel events such as storytelling workshops and performances. Cliffhangers is a non-profit initiative that aims to give a platform for marginalized voices and serves as a safe space for people to share their stories. In May 2018, she curated the first LGBTQ+ art exhibition in Lebanon, titled “Love Letters to Meem”. She is currently working on her first play that is scheduled to premiere in Beirut in Fall 2019.

TELL 53: 420
2019-04-20 19:00 - 21:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
TELL is an evening of story telling from the mouths and minds of queers in NYC hosted by Drae Campbell at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division since February 2014.
420 is the theme of the 53rd installment of TELL. Featuring stories by Renair Amin, Cara Francis, Joey Kipp, and Arianne “Bozo” Lombardi.
$10 suggested donation to support the Bureau and the performers. No one turned away for lack of funds.
Photograph by Grace Chu

Drae Campbell is a writer, actor, director, story teller, dancer, and nightlife emcee. Drae has been featured on Late Night with Conan O’Brien and on stages all over NYC. Drae’s directing work has appeared in Iceland, NYC, Budapest and in the San Francisco Fringe Festival. The short film Drae wrote and starred in with Rebecca Drysdale, YOU MOVE ME won the Audience Award for Outstanding Narrative Short at OUTFEST 2010 and has been shown in festivals globally. Drae won the grand prize at the first annual San Miguel De Allende Storytelling Festival in Mexico. She once reigned as Miss LEZ and also got dubbed “the next lezzie comedian on the block” by AfterEllen.com for her comedic stylings on the interwebs. Campbell hosts and curates a monthly queer storytelling show called TELL at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division. Check her out online! www.draecampbell.com.

Becoming a vessel of healing wasn’t an easy process for the Pink Love Specialist, Renair Amin. The person she is today has survived addiction, family tragedy, sexual assault, depression, grief, divorce, religious trauma and domestic violence. From those experiences, Renair penned four books – Mental Silhouette, Domestically Cursed, Pit Crew: How to Survive a Spiritual Pit Stop and Come with Me, Love: A 21-Day Journey into the Song of Solomon for couples. A life and relationship coach, she has also had the privilege of speaking across the nation helping others find Pink Love in their lives. In 2018, she was given the esteem honor of being named “Miss Full-Figured USA Miss Congeniality.” Renair just completed her Doctor of Ministry degree from New York Theological Seminary and is excited to walk down the aisle in May 2019.

Cara Francis is a writer, performer and a comedian. An ensemble member of The New York Neo-Futurists from 2008-2017, she designed and performed in The Complete and Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O’Neill, Vol 1 and 2 and The Soup Show. Her installation work includes “Stand” (Brooklyn Museum, IPA), “Remote” (Trouw, Amsterdam, NE, New Museum, New York for AUNTSisdance, First Person View, The Knockdown Center) and “Happy To See You” (Print Screen Festival, Tel Aviv, Automata Arts, Collapsable Hole, Dixon Place, The Wild Project). She regularly writes and performs original music as Fantasy Grandma (Bushwig, NY Comedy Festival at Carolines, Catch Performance Series). She is currently writing Dugout, a queer musical adaptation of A League Of Their Own as well as writing, directing and producing a series of short films with Julian Klepper about the people of New York City.

Joey Kipp is an NYC Dancer and performer.

Arianne “Bozo” Lombardi is a queer visual artist and musician from the Bronx. She is in the process of organizing her own songs into EP format, as she has spent her last 3 years primarily performing with local Bronx band “Brooks Thomas.” By daytime she is a bartender, and by side job she is a free-lance locksmith.

Turn dreams into stories! Myths, Magic & Imagination
2019-04-13 19:00 - 20:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Author and founder of Jaguar Luna Cultural Arts Collective, C. Huilo C. will talk about creating your own personal mythos and how the stories that come from this can influence how well we are treated in both the queer and the hetero worlds. In an evening in conversation with Stonewall-legacy author Perry Brass, Huilo will share their experiences living queerly within the majestic complexity of Mexico and Costa Rica. Huilo’s adventures in Latin America led to their writing and illustrating Tales of a Jaguar Magician – a new queer mythology. Huilo and Perry will talk about queer folk as the keepers of magic and healing and why are we feared? What is really behind our own magical side that few people talk about? How can we move from being tolerated to being celebrated as an integral and necessary part of a healthy society? Books and original illustrations will be available for sale and autographing.

Mythologist, visionary and full-spectrum artist, C. Huilo C. has published 5 books, art films, numerous art installations, experimental theatre presentations, is the founder of an arts & ecology center in Central America, owner of Teatro Jaguar Luna, Jaguar Moon Press, and leads an earth-ark reforestation project in Southern Costa Rica.
flight.jaguar@gmail.com
www.jaguarmoonpress.com
www.artistecologyresidency-jaguarluna.com
www.jaguarlunart.com
www.deep-woods-art.com

Activist, poet, and author Perry Brass has published 19 books, was a member of the Gay Liberation Front and co-editor of Come Out!, world’s first gay liberation newspaper, and co-founded the Gay Men’s Health Project Clinic, first clinic for gay men on the East Coast, now operating as Callen-Lorde Community Health Services, and the Rainbow Book Fair, the largest lgbt book event in the U.S.
belhuepress@earthlink.net
www.perrybrass.com

Social Sculpture for Individual Goals
2019-04-13 11:00 - 13:00, 2019-03-30 11:00 - 13:00, 2019-03-16 11:00 - 13:00, 2019-03-02 11:00 - 13:00, 2019-02-16 11:00 - 13:00 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Social Sculpture for Individual Goals is an opportunity to check in with others about your personal goals.
The way it works is very simple: A group of individuals gathers together, and, depending on how many individuals are present, together we decide on a specific amount of time that each person will be allotted to speak to the group about their personal goals. We ask for one person to volunteer as a timekeeper, and that person keeps track of time, letting the person who is speaking know when they have one minute remaining, and when their time is up.
As each one of us takes our turn to speak, the group listens quietly and gives us an opportunity to speak from the heart about our personal goals. This process of personal goal-related sharing can go in many different directions, and each person who speaks is welcome to use this time in whatever way feels most helpful to them. This process provides an opportunity for the speaker to sort out their thoughts, to gain clarity around personal goals, to share setbacks and successes, and to be accountable to others. As we listen to others, it is an opportunity for us to practice deep listening and to receive inspiration from others.
While this is not an overly rule-bound process, we do ask that attendees keep the following guidelines in mind:
– When it is someone else’s turn to speak, others in the group do not interrupt or query that person. We allow the person who is speaking to have ‘the stage’ to themself during their turn.
– During your own turn, keep the focus on yourself, and do not give feedback to others who have already spoken (note: it is okay to reference something someone else said, for example, something that inspired you–as long as you are mentioning it in relation to your own goals and your own process).
– Nobody is required to share. It is okay to attend and just listen to others, without sharing anything yourself. Also, it is okay if someone wants to speak for less than their allotted time.
– Please keep in mind that this is an open community forum; therefore, information that attendees choose to share is not considered confidential or anonymous.
This project is a collaboration between the Bureau and Ben G. Adams, a psychologist and artist whose work focuses on approaching tropes of personal and social transformation as art forms. The term ‘social sculpture’ was originally developed by 20th century conceptual artist Joseph Beuys in reference to the idea that all human beings are artists, and that all aspects of life can be approached as art forms. Ben’s previous work includes an art book and dieting system titled The Creative Process Diet, mixed media works in printmaking and sculpture, and another (currently ongoing) iteration of Social Sculpture for Individual Goals developed in collaboration with the Religious Society of Friends of Truth (a.k.a. ‘Quakers’) beginning in January 2017.

There is no required cost to attend Social Sculpture for Individual Goals, which is being very generously sponsored by the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division, an independent organization that is operated entirely by volunteers. During the meeting we will pass around a bowl so that everyone who attends will receive an opportunity to make a voluntary donation to support the Bureau. The suggested donation is $10, and we ask attendees to be as generous as possible in their support of the Bureau, which generously sponsors Social Sculpture for Individual Goals and many other community-building projects.

Baby Gay at the Bureau with Pamela Sneed & Gail Thacker!
2019-04-12 19:00 - 20:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Claire Fleury and Alesia Exum Present BABY GAY at Bureau of General Services—Queer Division! Hosted by Dusty Childers!
Baby Gay is a night of Queer Stories centered around those early days of budding Queerness. This, our second installment, features the incredible line up of Pamela Sneed and Gail Thacker.

About Pamela Sneed:
Pamela Sneed is a New York-based poet, writer, performer and emerging visual artist. She is author of Imagine Being More Afraid of Freedom than Slavery, KONG and Other Works and a chaplet, “Gift” by Belladonna. She has been featured in the New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Time Out, BOMB, VIBE, and on the cover of New York Magazine. She has appeared in Art Forum, The Huffington Post and Hyperallergic. In 2017, she was a Visiting Critic at Yale and Columbia University. She is a Visiting Professor at Columbia University’s School of the Arts for 2017/18. She is online faculty at Chicago’s School of the Art Institute teaching Human Rights and Writing Art and has also been a Visiting Artist at SAIC in the MFA summer low-res program for 3 consecutive years. She has performed at the Whitney Museum, Brooklyn Museum, Poetry Project, NYU and Pratt Universities, Smack Mellon Gallery, The High Line, Performa, Danspace, The Bessies, Performance Space, Joe’s Pub, The Public Theater, SMFA, BRIC and was an artist- in- residence at Pratt University, Denniston Hill and Poet-Linc, Lincoln Center Education.

About Gail Thacker:
Gail has been exhibited at the Museum of the City of New York, the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art; Centro Gallego de Arte Contemporáneo (CGAC), Spain; Boston University’s Stone Gallery, Daniel Cooney Fine Arts, Elizabeth Dee Gallery, Howl and Grey Art Gallery in New York, and others. Gail’s Polaroid work is in numerous collections such as The Institute of Contemporary Art (Boston, MA), Museum of the City of New York, the Fotomuseum Winterthur (Switzerland), CGAC (Spain), The New York Public Library, and The Polaroid Collection (Massachusetts). Publications, not including press-include Between the Sun and the Moon Gail Thacker’s Polaroids (City University of New York),The Polaroid Book (Taschen), Mark Dirt (Paper Chase Press), Tabboo! The Art of Stephen Tashjian (Damiani), There Was A Sense of Family; The Friends of Mark Morrisroe (Moderne Kunst Nürnbergsa), Gail Thacker Fugitive Moments (Howl) and Frontiers Journal of Women Studies (University of Nebraska Press).

Book Launch & Party for Victoria Noe’s Fag Hags, Divas and Moms
2019-04-11 19:00 - 21:00 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
A book launch and party to mark the publication of Fag Hags, Divas and Moms: The Legacy of Straight Women in the AIDS Community by Victoria Noe.

The history of the AIDS epidemic has largely been told from the perspective of gay men: their losses, their struggles, and contributions. But what about women – in particular, straight women? Not just Elizabeth Taylor and Princess Diana, but thousands whose accomplishments have never been recognized?

Drawing on personal interviews and archival research, Fag Hags, Divas and Moms: The Legacy of Straight Women in the AIDS Community is the first book to share the stories of women around the world, throughout the epidemic. Victoria Noe assures their place in women’s history, for their determination to educate and advocate, to end the epidemic once and for all.

She will be in conversation with one of the women in the book, Krishna Stone.

Victoria Noe is an award-winning Chicago author, speaker and activist. In 2006, she promised a dying friend that she’d write her first book about people grieving the death of a friend. That book turned into six-book series, including Friend Grief and AIDS: Thirty Years of Burying Our Friends. Her essay “Long-Term Survivor” won the 2015 Christopher Hewitt Award from A&U Magazine. She is a member of ACT UP/NY since 2013 and sits on the planning committee for the Chicago AIDS Garden.

Krishna Stone, one of the women featured in the book, is the Director of Community Relations for GMHC, where she has been a valuable staff member for over 25 years. In 2017, she served as a grand marshal for the NYC Pride March and will be honored next month with the Sam Ciccone Community Service Award from GOAL NY.

On Sabbatical
2019-04-10 19:00 - 20:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Writers Jonathan Alexander and A.W. Strouse are On Sabbatical.

Out to Lunch.

Gone Fishin’.

They will perform their enchanting, exquisite literary adventures.

Jonathan Alexander is the author, co-author, or editor of twelve previous books. A frequent contributor as essayist and reviewer to the Los Angeles Review of Books, he’s also Chancellor’s Professor of English at the University of California, Irvine and lives in Southern California.

A.W. Strouse teaches medieval literature at The New School, and has published a wide variety of creative works, including My Gay Middle Ages (punctum, 2015) and with Patty Barth, Transfer Queen (punctum, 2018).

Image: Henry Scott Tuke, The Bathers, 1888, oil on canvas, H 116.8 x W 86.3 cm, Leeds Art Gallery, Leeds Museums and Galleries, UK.

On Sex and Loss, Writing and Illuminations on Market Street with Wayne Hoffman and Benjamin Heim Shepard
2019-04-07 16:00 - 17:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Benjamin Heim Shepard and novelist Wayne Hoffman, discuss Shepard’s first novel, Illuminations on Market Street as well as Hoffman’s novels Hard, An Older Man, and Sweet Like Sugar, and his non-fiction anthology, Policing Public Sex. Both writers consider the lines between fiction and non-fiction, activism, loss, AIDS and the impacts of HIV on sex and culture in their works. Shepard’s novel begins in San Francisco in the early 1990s. Cab is on the deep end of a losing streak. After having been dumped yet again, he moves to Haight-Ashbury fresh out of college. It is the middle of a recession, before the dot-com boom, and AIDS is an immediate and untreatable reality. A story about AIDS and sex, acting up and praying for the dead, this is a story about living and fighting in the face of insurmountable challenges. Hoffman traces the stories Moe’s escapades through the Giuliani era War on Sex through years of trips to Provincetown to find something in himself as he ages and his community shifts.

Copies of Illuminations on Market Street and works by Wayne Hoffman are available for purchase at the Bureau. To reserve copies please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!

Benjamin Shepard is a Brooklyn based activist. He is also the author/editor of ten including White Nights and Ascending Shadows: An Oral History of the San Francisco AIDS Epidemic (1997), From ACT UP to the WTO: Urban Protest and Community Building in the Era of Globalization (2002), The Beach Beneath the Streets (with Greg Smithsimon, 2011), Brooklyn Tides (with Mark Noonan, 2018), and Rebel Friendships (2015). Illuminations on Market Street is his first novel.

Wayne Hoffman is the author of the novels Hard, An Older Man, and the Stonewall Book Award-winning Sweet Like Sugar, and co-editor of the anthology Policing Public Sex: Queer Politics and the Future of AIDS Activism. Currently executive editor of Tablet Magazine, his cultural reporting has appeared in Washington Post, Slate, the Nation, Village Voice, Out, Poz, and elsewhere.

Audio Fiction Femmes — Panel ft. Eli Barraza, Lisette Alvarez, Lia Hagen, and Jordan Cobb
2019-04-06 19:00 - 20:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
AUDIO FICTION FEMMES” is a panel of queer podcast creators exploring questions of new media, marginalization, and magic. The panel features Lisette Alvarez (Kalila Stomfire’s Economical Magick Services, Magic King Dom), Eli Barraza (The Far Meridian, Ars Paradoxica) Jordan Cobb (Here Be Dragons, Janus Descending), and Lia Hagen (Overkill).

Jordan Cobb: Jordan is a New York City based actress and writer. She trained at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. After graduating, she founded two production companies — Black Lace and Laser Beams, and No Such Thing Productions — which focus on the development of new and innovative audio drama podcasts. Jordan works as head writer and producer for both companies, and she voices the characters of Harper Bennett and Dr. Natalya Atlas in Black Lace and Laser Beam’s action/adventure audio drama, Here Be Dragons, and Chel in No Such Thing Production’s sci-fi/horror limited series, Janus Descending.

LISETTE ALVAREZ: Lisette is a podcaster, storyteller, digital strategist, and globetrotter. They are the writer, producer, and main character of the fantasy audio drama “Kalila Stormfire’s Economical Magick Services”. They also play Dom in the dystopic audio drama “Magic King Dom”. A third culture kid with 20 countries under their belt, Lisette is also a queer, witchy Latinx creator who wants more stories that reflect their reality. You can follow them on Twitter @lisettewalking or learn more about them at www.lisettealvarez.com.

ELI BARRAZA: Eli is the creator of The Far Meridian, a loosely magical realist audio drama. Her involvement in the world of narrative podcasting includes ars Paradoxica, The Bright Sessions, Our Fair City, Greater Boston, and more. In her spare time, Eli learns about astronomy, climbs rocks, and wanders the wayward streets of Los Angeles and its outlying areas. The best way to learn more about her is to follow her on twitter @EliLizzieLizbet

LIA HAGEN: Lia Hagen is an overly enthusiastic girl studying digital storytelling at NYU. Originally from Omaha, Nebraska, she now lives in NYC. She founded the production company Gal Pals Present. Fans say “Gal Pals Present lovingly crafts every character, every interaction, every story,” and her team has been described as everything from “strong femmes under five foot four” to “local gays doing the Lord’s work.” She also writes and directs the podcast “Overkill.”

OLNY Poly Movie Night: My Wife Got Married
2019-04-03 18:30 - 21:30 | NY
Open Love NY presents Poly Movie Night, a FREE series of feature films that focus on the portrayal of consensual / ethical non-monogamy in cinema. This month we’ll be at our regular venue, the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division.

On April 3rd, please join us for My Wife Got Married (2008), directed by Yun-su Chong and starring Ju-hyuk Kim, Ye-jin Son, and Seong-hun Cheon .

We’ll meet at 6:30 pm at the Bureau (in room 210 of The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center at 208 West 13th Street) for pre-screening socializing and start the movie at 7 pm. The event is free, although a $10 suggested donation to help fund future events is much appreciated.

Synopsis: When Deok-hyun and In-ah fall in love, he thinks marriage will turn her monogamous, even though she’s very clearly told him that she’s not. When she meets another man, his jealousy and possessiveness threaten to ruin all their relationships. Running time: 1 hour 59 minutes. In Korean with English subtitles.

NYC Gay Guys' Book Club
2019-04-02 19:00 - 21:00 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
We are a group of gay guys of all ages who meet the first Tuesday of every month. We usually meet at the Jefferson Market branch of the public library on 6th Avenue & West 10th Street, but we’ll meet at the Bureau while the library is being renovated. We read an eclectic range of books from classics to newly-released works. We don’t necessarily read books with a gay theme or characters and always open to suggestions. Very easy going; more social than academic. You don’t necessarily have to commit to coming every single month, just whenever your schedule or reading tastes permit. This month (April) we are discussing Imagine Me Gone, by Adam Haslett.

On Tuesday, May 7th, we’ll discuss Rabih Alameddine‘s Angel of History.

On Tuesday, June 4th, we’ll discuss Joan Dempsey‘s This Is How It Begins.

The above titles (and many more!) are available for purchase at the Bureau. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you for your support!

Hal Schrieve presents "Out of Salem" with Jeanne Thornton and Cat Fitzpatrick
2019-03-29 19:00 - 21:00 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Celebrate the publication of Hal Schrieve‘s debut novel Out of Salem, a biting, hilariously macabre story of misfit monsters fighting repression and bigotry (and trying to pass 9th grade) in mid-90’s Salem, Oregon.

Hal will be joined by authors Jeanne Thornton and Cat Fitzpatrick for a conversation following the reading.

Copies of Out of Salem will be available for purchase at the event. To reserve a copy please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!

“Set in 1997, this darkly humored fantasy explores censorship, government surveillance, homelessness, and real-world (not just magical) forms of oppression. . . Tension burns hot until the explosive conclusion, which begs for a sequel. On fire with magic and revolution.” –Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

HAL SCHRIEVE grew up in Olympia, Washington, and is competent at making risotto and setting up a tent. Xie has worked as an after-school group leader, a summer camp counselor, a flower seller, a tutor, a grocer, and a babysitter. Hir current ambition is to become a librarian. Xie has a BA in history with a minor in English from University of Washington and studies library science at Queens College, New York. Xie lives in Brooklyn, New York, and hir poetry has appeared in Vetch magazine. This is hir first novel.

JEANNE THORNTON is the author of “The Dream of Doctor Bantam” and “The Black Emerald,” both Lambda Literary Award finalists. She is the co-publisher of Instar Books and creator of the web comics “The Man Who Hates Fun” and “Bad Mother.” She lives in Brooklyn.

CAT FITZPATRICK teaches at Rutgers University–Newark. She wrote the book of poems “Glamourpuss” and co-edited the Stonewall-Award-winning anthology “Meanwhile Elsewhere: Science Fiction and Fantasy from Transgender Writers.” She is currently working on a verse novel in Onegin stanzas about trans women making terrible choices. This is a topic she knows a fair bit about.

Virtual Tour of LGBT+ Secrets of Europe's Museums & Monuments
2019-03-28 18:30 - 21:00 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
OUT PROFESSIONALS PRESENTS PROFESSOR ANDREW LEAR ON THE HIDDEN ROLE OF SAME-SEX LOVE IN SHAPING EUROPE’S GREAT URBAN CENTERS.
Rome, Florence, Pompeii, Athens, Delphi, Berlin — all great places to visit, rich with fascinating history and fabulous art.
But are you aware of the key role that same-sex love played in shaping these urban centers? And of the roles that they, in turn, have played in creating gay history?
On Thursday, March 28, Out Professionals presents Professor Andrew Lear with “LGBT Secrets of Europe’s Museums and Monuments.” A longtime OP favorite for his private “Gay Secrets” tours of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Lear has taught art history and Classics at Harvard, Columbia and NYU.
For this event Professor Lear focuses on European museums and monuments with roles in gay history. He discusses historical figures and relates stories behind historical events and great art, uncovering hidden meanings.
During the evening you discover:
· Which gay couple founded the world’s first democracy?
· Which emperor’s boy toy became a god?
· What was the first nude statue of the Renaissance?
· Which Christian saint did Japanese author Yukio Mishima venerate?
· What was the world’s first gay rights organization?
· Who was Berlin’s coolest gay, Jewish, anti-Nazi resistance fighter?
· And what was the ballsiest thing he did?
Professor Andrew Lear has taught art history and Classics at Harvard, Columbia, and NYU. Lear is the founder of Oscar Wilde Tours, the first company to offer tours focused on LGBT history, and the winner of the Travel Industry’s 2016 Travvy Award for best-escorted tour operator, LGBT; and of the Luxury Travel Guide’s 2016 award, LGBT Tour Operator of the Year.
WHERE
The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division, in room 210 of The LGBT Community Center, 208 West 13th Street, between 7th and 8th Avenues. Subway: 1/2/3, A/C/E or F/M to 14th Street; L to 6th or 8th Avenue.
WHAT’S UP
Meet at the Bureau at 6:30 p.m. for networking and seat selection. From 7 to 9 p.m., slide presentation, discussion, Q&A.
The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is an independent, all-volunteer queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space located in room 210 of The LGBT Community Center. Beer, wine, and soft drinks available.

TICKETS

Dues-paying Individual or Business Member of Out Professionals, $10 with advance registration; $15 at the door, if available. Event limited to 40 attendees. Pre-registration is highly recommended and closes at noon on March 28. Sorry, no refunds or exchanges. Please print and pocket a copy of your online receipt. Thanks!

$10 for nonmembers of Out Professional with promotional code: OUTBUREAU

Be sure to enter the promotional code and select nonmember tickets in order to receive the discount.

JOIN NOW — ATTEND FREE!

Enjoy a 12-month Individual Out Professionals Membership PLUS one ticket for tonight — just $65. Individual membership includes free entry to every month’s OP.LOUNGE and discounted admission at other OP events. Or choose the enhanced benefits of Business Membership ($125): Enjoy free admission tonight and by registering in advance, enjoy free or discounted admission at a year’s worth of other OP seminars and workshops. All sales final.

Joe Ovelman Book Event, "On Grief," 2019 & Talk w/ Fred Howard
2019-03-24 15:00 - 16:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Book release and signing with Joe Ovelman. Join Joe and longtime companion, Fred Howard, as they discuss Joe’s new book, “On Grief,” 2019. “On Grief” recounts events from the artist’s life in illustrated text and drawings, serving a soothing balm for loss. Also by Joe Ovelman: “Pictures and Words,” 2018, sthEditions, and “Destination Wedding,” 2018.

Fred Howard is a NYC-based comedic writer and publicist. https://www.identitytalentpr.com

Joe Ovelman is a visual artist and author that lives and works in NYC and Philadelphia.
https://www.joeovelman.com

The Fops — A new play about Queer identity by Jack Shamblin
2019-03-23 19:00 - 21:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
THE FOPS by Jack Shamblin bubbled up out of recent work-in-progress performances at Dixon Place. Sharing his new script and his birthday at the same time, he welcomes you to an artful reading, live music, and some good pink cake.
“Partying too hard, the aging Queer Monty time travels to Victorian New York’s Paresis Hall, an all-male bordello. Engaging with the riff-raff, men-who-love-men, intellectuals, and twisted moralists; he confronts the frailty of his proud gay identity. Homo present meets past, and the future is up for grabs.”

Jack has come a long, long way from that Bible-Belt Eastern Oklahoma town where he grew up, a two-hour drive from the headquarters of the Ku Klux Klan. Back in the eighties, when he drummed-up enough courage to tell a friend he was gay, she told him he would “die of Aids and then roast for eternity.” His adoring mother went homophobic and threatened disownment. Depression followed, Jack was locked inside himself with so much to say but with no vehicle of expression. He calls it his “silent-state-of-Bohemia: a place full of singers without voices, dancers without legs and writers without hands.”
Fast-forward to 2018 and meet the new and evolved Jack/Mia — international writer, actor, director, comedian, performance artist, and activist. He’s created with Caryl Churchill, Kate Bornstein, Alexis Arquette, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jayne Atkinson, Theodora Skipitares, Basil Twist, Ellie Covan, and Mark Wing-Davey. His plays performed at La MaMa, Dixon Place, HERE, and abroad. An anthology of his work Queering The Stage is on the shelves of BGSQD. He not only found his voice, his legs and his hands, but he clarified his direction as a queer leader and role model in the arts.
(This bio, crafted originally by Bob Criso for theatre blog Hi! Drama, has been edited by Mia Kunter Productions.)

Photograph by Bob Criso, from left to right: Graceann Dorse, Daniel Diaz, Goldie Luxe, Kevin Mimms, Michael Witkes, Brandi Azinionae, Nicholas Gorham, Matt “Ugly” McGlade.

Leo and David, a tale of two angels book signing
2019-03-22 19:00 - 20:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Leo Lives in a far away kingdom, a peaceful place where his family rules and he longs to bring joy and beauty to his people. Engaged to a princess, Leo soon fall in love with a man from his city. However, as political unrest comes to his country, Leo must flee and learn to navigate a new world, all the while trying to find love, and to love himself, along the way. Both a coming of age story and a fairytale, Leo and David: A Tale of Two Angels (Rosedog Books, $10) is a heartwarming and fantastical look into one man’s journey to a happy ending.

Copies of Leo and David will be available for purchase at the Bureau. To reserve a copy please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!

Luca Leonvago first finished his degree in classical studies and then started his degree in business followed by an MBA and a doctorate in Economics. After working in the Fashion Industry in Milan, Rome, and Paris, he moved to London where he started his academic career. He is currently Associate Chair for Fashion marketing and luxury brand management at SCAD, Atlanta.He is also a member of the British Research group progressiveconnexions based in Oxford (UK). In 2013 he co-founded with David Boyd-Carrigan, greeceneedslove Inc., a non-profit organization pro the reunification of the Parthenon Marbles which mission is to help artists, artisans and researchers from Greece or with Greece as the main subject of their work. Greeceneedslove supports the production of contemporary Greek Art while preserving the Greek Art History as common roots to the world.

Paradesign: The Work of Tobias Wong, A Panel Discussion
2019-03-21 19:45 - 21:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Join us for Paradesign: The Work of Tobias Wong, A Panel Discussion moderated by designer, curator, and gallery director Olivia Shao, with Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator, Department of Architecture and Design, Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Rama Chorpash, Associate Professor and the Director of Product Design at Parsons The New School for Design.
Paradesign: The Work of Tobias Wong is presented by the curators of Tobias Wong, “Untitled” (Golden) …, Dean MacGregor and Pablo Griff.
This event is free, but attendees are encouraged to support the Bureau by purchasing books and/or making a donation.

About the exhibition:
Tobias Wong, “Untitled” (Golden) …
January 18 – April 14, 2019
Download a PDF of the press release.
New York, New York –The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is proud to present Tobias Wong, “Untitled” (Golden) …, an exhibition of the late artist/designer’s work that played with the definition of what constituted art or design. The exhibition will present a selection of his work alongside objects from his personal collection that served as muses for his artistic design work. This includes a wide variety of table lamps as well as ephemera that he collected.
In a press release issued at the time of Wong’s death in 2010, architecture and design curator, friend, and colleague Aric Chen wrote: “Through his work, Wong helped bring forth much of what is now taken for granted in contemporary culture. Influenced by Dada and, especially, Fluxus, he questioned authorship through appropriation; held a mirror to our desires and absurdities; upended the hierarchy between design and art, and the precious and the banal; and helped redefine collaboration and curation as creative practices. Working within what he termed a “paraconceptual” framework, Wong prompted a reevaluation of everything we thought we knew about design: its production, its psychological resonance, its aesthetic criteria, its means of distribution, its attachment to provenance, its contextualization and its manner of presentation. Wong was a keen observer, an original mind, a brilliant prankster, and an unerring friend.
“Wong’s work was widely exhibited, including at the Museum of Modern Art and Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. His many projects included those for Colette, Comme des Garcons, Prada/OMA, Cappellini and Swarovski Crystal Palace. In addition to the objects he created, re-created, repurposed, rarefied and otherwise manipulated, Wong’s work included events and happenings that included, among many others, a pop-up tattoo parlor at Art Basel Miami Beach/Design Miami and the Wrong Store, a “store” in New York that was in fact never open. (As with much of Wong’s work, both were collaborations.) Wong was named Young Designer of the Year by Wallpaper* magazine (2004) as well as the Brooklyn Museum of Art (2006). In 2008 and 2009, he served as founding co-creative director of 100% Design Shanghai, affiliated with the 100% Design fairs in London and Tokyo.
“Born and raised in Vancouver, Wong studied in Toronto before moving to New York in 1997 to attend the Cooper Union, from which he graduated with a major in sculpture.”

The exhibition is curated by:
Dean MacGregor, an artist who has done projects at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Morgan Library and many others. He recently did his sleeping project at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
Pablo Griff is an artist and was a consultant to the retrospective of Tobias Wong’s work at the Museum of Vancouver in 2012.

Image: Tobias Wong, blue anus, 1998 (replica 2016 courtesy Lite Brite Neon, Brooklyn), Estate of Tobias Wong

Learn more about the work of Tobias Wong:
Tobi’s website
“From A to Wong, and Back Again,” Flash Art May-June 2015
Tobi’s works in San Francisco MOMA collection
NY Times obituary, June 3, 2010

TELL 52: I MADE IT!
2019-03-16 19:00 - 21:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
TELL is an evening of story telling from the mouths and minds of queers in NYC hosted by Drae Campbell at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division since February 2014.

I MADE IT! is the theme of the 52nd installment of TELL. Featuring stories by Varín Ayala, Hector Canonge, Buzz Slutzky, and Dennis Yueh-Yeh Li.

$10 suggested donation to support the Bureau and the performers. No one turned away for lack of funds.

Photograph by Grace Chu

Drae Campbell is a writer, actor, director, story teller, dancer, and nightlife emcee. Drae has been featured on Late Night with Conan O’Brien and on stages all over NYC. Drae’s directing work has appeared in Iceland, NYC, Budapest and in the San Francisco Fringe Festival. The short film Drae wrote and starred in with Rebecca Drysdale, YOU MOVE ME won the Audience Award for Outstanding Narrative Short at OUTFEST 2010 and has been shown in festivals globally. Drae won the grand prize at the first annual San Miguel De Allende Storytelling Festival in Mexico. She once reigned as Miss LEZ and also got dubbed “the next lezzie comedian on the block” by AfterEllen.com for her comedic stylings on the interwebs. Campbell hosts and curates a monthly queer storytelling show called TELL at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division. Check her out online! www.draecampbell.com.

Varín Ayala: Off Broadway: The Taming of the Shrew (TFANA with Maggie Siff; dir, Arin Arbus); NY Theater: Contigo (Signature); 365 Days/Plays (The Public); Jackson Heights 3AM (Theater 167): Las Facultades, The Beep (Pregones); Barber Surgeons (Studio 42); End of Summer, Love’s Labour’s Lost (Kaleidoscope at Cherry Lane); Numerous readings and workshops at NYTW, The Public, INTAR, The Lark, among others. Regional Theater: Pinkolandia (Two River Theater; premiere), The Motherf**er with the Hat (Hartford TheaterWorks), The Road to Washington (Mountain Playhouse), Angels in America I/II (Civic Theater of Allentown). TV: Lie to Me, Hustling. Training: The Actors Center Conservatory, Shakespeare Lab at The Public, Groundlings.

Hector Canonge is an interdisciplinary artist, independent curator, and cultural entrepreneur based in New York City. His work incorporates the use of new media technologies, cinematic narratives, Live Action Art, and Social Practice to explore and treat issues related to constructions of identity, gender roles, and the politics of migration. Challenging the white box settings of a gallery or a museum, or intervening directly in public spaces, his performances mediate movement, endurance, and ritualistic processes. Some of his actions and carefully choreographed performances involve collaborating with other artists and interacting with audiences. His installations, interactive platforms, performance art work, and literary readings have been exhibited and presented in the United States, Latin America, Europe and Asia.

In the Summer of 2018, Canonge undertook two major projects that took him to North Africa, Asia, and Europe: his multinational project “TEMPTATIONS” produced and presented in Morocco, Egypt, Turkey, Cyprus, and Greece, and “PORTALS” & “REFLEJOS” in collaboration with Verónica Peña presented in Marseille, France, and Mallorca, Granada and La Rioja in Spain. In the Fall of 2018, the artist presented and connected with artists and creatives in Moscow, Russia, and in participated in the Morni Hills Performance Art Biennale II in India where his project, “AWAKENINGS” was featured. Canonge was invited to participate in the Teacher’s College Teaching Artist Certificate Program (2018-2019), and is currently preparing for future presentations in the United States, Argentina, Mexico and Germany.

Buzz Slutzky is a non-binary transgender artist, writer, and performer whose practice incorporates drawing, painting, sculpture, and video. Their visual art and writing often play between autobiographical and historical content. Lately, they’ve been drawing mashups between instructional manuals. As a performer, Buzz has mixed stand-up comedy and musical comedy under the persona Stoni Butchell, among others. They currently teach film and art to 18 year olds at CUNY College of Staten Island and SUNY Purchase College.

Originally from Taiwan, Dennis Yueh-Yeh Li earned his Master’s degree in Performance Studies at New York University. He works as director, playwright, performer, and performance artist, having created projects addressed upon sexuality, philosophy, and politics, to give his unique perspectives on time, space, and power relations. His thesis performance piece “Kiss Me, so I am Queer”, curated by Chashama, talks about the temporality of queerness and the social construction of queer identity. Currently, he is the Associate Artistic Director of the Living Theatre, and the New York Directing fellow of Drama League.

Esther Newton & Jean Carlomusto: Book Launch & Film Sneak Peek
2019-03-15 19:00 - 20:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
Join author Esther Newton and filmmaker Jean Carlomusto for a celebration of MY BUTCH CAREER, Newton’s new memoir which tells the compelling, disarming, and at times sexy story of her struggle to write, teach, and find love, all while coming to terms with her identity during a particularly intense time of homophobic persecution in the twentieth century.

This unprecedented public conversation will combine selected readings from Newton’s memoir with a sneak peek of scenes from Carlomusto’s upcoming feature-length documentary. AGILITY: A PORTRAIT OF ESTHER NEWTON, which uses the lens of Newton’s love for a sport — competitive dog agility — to explore the flexibility, resilience and passionate inquiry that have driven her survival as a butch woman and trailblazing scholar in a world of obstacles. A reception and book-signing will follow the presentation.

This event is free, but attendees are encouraged to support the Bureau and the author by purchasing books and/or making a donation.

Copies of My Butch Career are available for purchase at the Bureau. To reserve a copy please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!

Director/Producer Jean Carlomusto, Producer Shanti Avirgan, and AGILITY film subjects Esther Newton, Sammy and Viva

ESTHER NEWTON is a founder of and leading scholar in LGBTQ studies. She is the author of several books, including Margaret Mead Made Me Gay: Personal Essays, Public Ideas and Cherry Grove, Fire Island: Sixty Years in America’s First Gay and Lesbian Town, both also published by Duke University Press, as well as the groundbreaking Mother Camp: Female Impersonators in America. She has taught at Purchase College of the State University of New York, the University of Paris VII, Paris, France and the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor). She was active in Second Wave Feminism, Gay Liberation and the Lesbian/Feminist movements. Her work has been translated into French, Spanish, Hebrew, Polish and Slovak.

JEAN CARLOMUSTO’s films have been featured internationally in film festivals, museum exhibitions and on television. Her acclaimed feature documentary for HBO, LARRY KRAMER IN LOVE & ANGER, premiered at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival in the U.S. Documentary Competition and was nominated for two Emmy Awards. Carlomusto co-produced, directed and edited SEX IN AN EPIDEMIC, which premiered on Showtime on World AIDS Day, 2011. Her personal films are often unorthodox investigative reports on subjects that have been all but erased from history. TO CATCH A GLIMPSE, (Museum of Modern Art, NYC, permanent collections) delved into her family history by trying to find out if the rumors about her grandmother’s death — from an illicit abortion back in 1939 –were true. In L IS FOR THE WAY YOU LOOK, she pieced together lesbian history using whatever scraps of gossip and memory she could find into a humorous portrait of a population’s creative tussle for visibility and inclusion.

PRAISE FOR MY BUTCH CAREER

John D’Emilio: “In My Butch Career Esther Newton takes her readers through her chaotic family history, the uncharted territory of coming to terms with an identity that is far outside the norms for her generation, and the transforming effects that new social movements had on her. Bringing personalities, scenes, conversations, and relationships to life, Newton has written a book that is powerful, gripping, and immensely readable.”

Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy: “Esther Newton’s sharp insights into her developing consciousness are sometimes so precise and revealing that they take my breath away. Her wit gives her personal traumas in a hostile society universal meaning, making her pain and pleasure available to all, while her reflections on the interconnections of gender, sex, and feminism in love-making remain fresh. Capturing the multiple layers of identity and examining how social forces shape our lives, My Butch Career is absolutely unique in the way it explores women’s desire as both personal and social. I know of no other memoir like it.”

Tim Retzloff: “[Esther] is a formidable scholar of striking and stern beauty. I am fortunate and grateful to know her. Get a copy of My Butch Career and delve into a past that belongs to Esther personally and, thanks to her generous sharing, to all of us queer folk collectively. Read it. Relish it.”

Office Hours Presents: Craft Class & Reading with JP Howard
2019-03-09 11:00 - 14:30 | NY
Office Hours Poetry Workshop presents: “Telling Your Story: Poetry & Memoir”– a FREE craft class and reading with author JP Howard.
The craft class takes place from 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM. A public reading with JP Howard and members of the Office Hours Workshop will follow from 1:30 PM-2:30 PM.
Spaces for the craft class are limited to 15 persons so please RSVP in advance to sarahmariesala@gmail.com and include your full name, relationship to writing, and a brief bio.

“Telling Your Story: Poetry & Memoir”
Participants will use objects of significance, including family photos, memorabilia, personal narratives and/or oral her/histories to enter memoir-themed poems. We will ask questions that both challenge and inspire us. Whose story are we telling, particularly when writing about loved ones that are no longer with us. How important is it that our poems be historically accurate? When do we give ourselves permission to honestly write our painful Herstories? Whose story are we trying to tell? Is this our story to tell? These are a few of the questions we will explore as we use our personal narratives, photos and oral Her/histories to enter poems. If possible, participants should bring a minimum of 2-3 family photos and/or photos of significance (either actual photos or photos on a tablet/smart phone), 1-2 photos of family memorabilia or objects of significance and come prepared to use oral family Her/histories to write poems that use memory as foundation. Poetic forms written in class may include haibun, persona or narrative poems. Handouts of poems in the memoir genre will be distributed and discussed. Some of the poets we may read in workshop include Angel Nafis, Amber Atiya, Mahogany L. Browne, Elisabet Velasquez, and Pat Parker.

Office Hours Poetry Workshop provides post-MFA poets access to continued support for manuscript-development and everyday writing. The workshop culminates in a public reading each fall and spring to showcase sizzling new work. We welcome all poets, especially people of color, LGBTQ+, and those who are woman-identified. Our name derives from our side hustle. Many of us are freelance, adjunct instructors, who continue to thrive in the margins of academia.

JP Howard’s debut poetry collection, SAY/MIRROR (The Operating System), was a Lambda Literary finalist. She is also the author of bury your love poems here (Belladonna*) and co-editor of Sinister Wisdom Journal Black Lesbians–We Are the Revolution! (2018). JP is a 2019 featured author in Lambda Literary’s LGBTQ Writers in Schools program and the recipient of a 2019 Brooklyn Arts Council grant. She was a Split this Rock Freedom Plow Award for Poetry & Activism finalist and is featured in the Lesbian Poet Trading Card Series from Headmistress Press. JP was the recipient of a Lambda Literary Judith A. Markowitz Emerging Writer Award and has received fellowships and grants from Cave Canem, VONA, Lambda Literary, and Astraea. JP curates Women Writers in Bloom Poetry Salon, a NY-based forum offering all writers, but especially women, a monthly venue to collaborate. JP is an Editor-at-Large at Mom Egg Review online. Her poetry and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in Academy of American Poets, Anomaly, Apogee Journal, The Feminist Wire, Split this Rock, Muzzle Magazine, and The Best American Poetry Blog. Her poetry is widely anthologized. JP holds a BA from Barnard College, an MFA in Creative Writing from The City College of New York and a JD from Brooklyn Law School. Visit JP online at: jp-howard.com

OLNY Poly Movie Night: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
2019-03-06 18:30 - 21:30 | NY
Open Love NY presents Poly Movie Night, a FREE series of feature films that focus on the portrayal of consensual / ethical non-monogamy in cinema. This month we’ll be at our regular venue, the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division.

On March 6th, please join us for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), written by William Goldman and starring Robert Redford, Paul Newman, and Katherine Ross.

We’ll meet at 6:30 pm at the Bureau (in room 210 of The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center at 208 West 13th Street) for pre-screening socializing and start the movie at 7 pm. The event is free, although a $10 suggested donation to help fund future events is much appreciated.

Synopsis: Based on the true story of the train/bank robbers Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid who led a gang in the early 1900’s, the film follows them as they are hunted by a super-posse. Running time: 1 hour 50 minutes.

Scissoring Publication Extravaganza!
2019-02-23 19:00 - 21:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
This month SCISSORING is officially released by Dramatists Play Service and we want to celebrate its publication with a gathering and small series of readings from the play. Join us for a spirited celebration of queer lady lit & love–plus donuts!

Copies of Scissoring will soon be available for purchase at the Bureau. To reserve a copy please write to us at contact@bgsqd.com. Please support the Bureau by buying books from us. Thank you!

TELL 51: FRIENDSHIP - FIVE YEAR ANNIVERSARY EDITION!
2019-02-16 19:00 - 21:30 | Online event, New York, NY, United States
TELL is an evening of story telling from the mouths and minds of queers in NYC hosted by Drae Campbell at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division since February 2014.

FRIENDSHIP is the theme of the 51st installment of TELL. Come celebrate the fifth anniversary of TELL!

Featuring stories by Nilan, Summer Minerva, Seedy Edie, Jes Tom, and Lisa Haas.

$10 suggested donation to support the Bureau and the performers. No one turned away for lack of funds.

Photograph by Grace Chu

Drae Campbell is a writer, actor, director, story teller, dancer, and nightlife emcee. Drae has been featured on Late Night with Conan O’Brien and on stages all over NYC. Drae’s directing work has appeared in Iceland, NYC, Budapest and in the San Francisco Fringe Festival. The short film Drae wrote and starred in with Rebecca Drysdale, YOU MOVE ME won the Audience Award for Outstanding Narrative Short at OUTFEST 2010 and has been shown in festivals globally. Drae won the grand prize at the first annual San Miguel De Allende Storytelling Festival in Mexico. She once reigned as Miss LEZ and also got dubbed “the next lezzie comedian on the block” by AfterEllen.com for her comedic stylings on the interwebs. Campbell hosts and curates a monthly queer storytelling show called TELL at the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division. Check her out online! www.draecampbell.com.

Nilan is a performer, creator, teaching artist, and company member of A Certain Something. In April 2019, Nilan will be holding a stage reading of his new play BY HIS HANDS, IF NOT BY GODS a story about the intersectionality between race and sexuality in northern Alabama. Some playwrighting/screenwriting credits: AND THEN I WOKE A VICARIOUS CATACLYSMIC EVENT (Downtown Art), EXTRA ROOM (web),BLOOD PROMISE (workshop, New Shakespeare Exchange), ENDANGERED SPECIES (workshop, 2017 Bay Area Playwrights Festival), (workshop, The New American Theatre Co. NY), (reading, Red Fern Theatre), JOAN (reading, Oppressed in Heels) THE SHADOW IN THE CORNER (48 Hours in Harlem),OLD SCHOOL (24 Hour Pridefest),WATER FROM THE TAP andAN AMERICAN TALE (NY Indie One Minute Play Festival), FROM CANAL TO 207 ST and GENTLEMEN (Intar One Minute Play Festival),AMERICAN IDIOT (Our Country/Our Response Play Festival),THE SAINT AND THE SINNER (reading, Wagon Wheel Arts). Some acting credits: NYC: And Then I Woke: A Vicarious Cataclysmic Event (Downtown Art),Next Faggot Nation Self-Accusation: The Remix (LPAC, Bedlam MadLab), (Dixon Place)Bar Play (Peculiar Works Project),Trojan Women (Oppressed in Heels),The Champion (Bric Arts), Regional:Metamorphosis, Assassins, A Raisin in the Sun, Clybourne Park, The Parchman Hour, Henry IV, Henry V, and The Imaginary Invalid (PlayMakers Repertory Company), Radio Golf (Deep Dish Theater), 10×10 in the Triangle (ArtsCenter Carrboro). Internationally: Playback Theatre (Playback Berlin) (Second International Conference for the Arts in Society, Kassel, Germany). Some Media: CONSENT IS SEXY, a four episode PSA campaign about supporting consensual sexual behavior (YouTube). He holds an M.F.A. in Acting from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. www.nilan.me

Summer Minerva is an Italian American actor, performance artist, writer, public speaker and educator. As a respected authority and published writer on the intersections of gender, spirituality and performance (Written on the Body, 2018; Voyages of the Black Madonna, 2019), they have spoken at Sarah Lawrence College, Temple University, the International Transgender Day of Remembrance in Rio de Janeiro, the LGBTQ pride of Napoli and Pompeii 2018, and Peace House Haiti. Their solo performances have shown at Gibney Dance Center, the American Dance Festival and Judson Memorial Church.Their mission right now is to love the people of the world boldly and specifically.

Photograph by James A. Ridley

Born in Canada and based in Brooklyn, Seedy Edie is an actor and burlesque performer who specializes in giving you nightmares and giving good face. Recent credits: Bettie Page, Becoming Bettie Page (Coney Island USA); Girl 1956, The Miss Twin Peaks Pageant (Joe’s Pub at the Public).

Jes Tom (they/them) is a New York based actor, writer, and weird queer stand up comic, gleefully providing the nonbinary queer Asian American radical cyborg perspective that everyone never knew they wanted. They have appeared in videos by Funny Or Die and Seriously.TV, and their writing has been published by Reductress, By Shondaland, and Condé Nast’s Them. Jes has been featured in GO Magazine, Splitsider, and the Fader, and they were named one of TimeOut New York’s “LGBTQ POC Comedians We’re Obsessed With.” Jes was a 2018 StandUp NBC semifinalist. Follow Jes on Twitter @jestom and Instagram @jesthekid.

Lisa Haas is a writer and actor. She has appeared in films and performed in many NYC downtown venues—and—you can catch her on episodes 1 and 2 of the third season of “Search Party”. Please pay a visit to her website! www.lisa-haas.com
