Classic Homoerotic images 13

 

 

 

The last post in this series about the Sailor's heart shaped backside reminded me of this image by the same artist. I should have included it in this series long ago, since it is meant to be primarily about gay images that penetrated the consciousness of the world outside the gay ghetto and reached out to closeted gays. This picture certainly did that. 

 

The fifties and sixties were the heyday of Cowboy movies and TV shows and somewhere along the line the isolated lifestyle of cattle herders, remote from civilisation for long periods, in isolated groups, earned them a similar reputation to sailors on the high seas. That is, for having a taste for releasing their sexual tensions man-to-man without undermining their masculinity.

 

However, this pair's casual nudity and mutual preening might have caused some discomfort for real cowboys because they are unmistakeably gay to all and sundry, not just other gays. They might easily be a couple and there's an interesting resemblance to Tom of Finland's popular Leather Buddy-Lovers image. This playful scene shows a maturing of Colt's imagery beyond sexual innuendo into portraying gay relationships and gay men as normal people who are not defined exclusively by their sexuality, or their jobs. 

Sadly it still required 'nudge nudge' humour to get the message out. 

 

This picture was destined to bring Colt to the attention of the wider world when Malcolm Maclaren added captions and Vivienne Westwood put the result onto T-shirts during the punk era (1975). At that time in the UK, gay sex was legal, but only in private and the Police were actively trying to minimise the definition of privacy (to exclude hotel rooms and shared accommodation for example). Moreover, indecency laws were still in place and to wear this T-shirt in the street was to flaunt them and risk arrest and prosecution. For a straight man or woman to wear it was therefore a powerful statement of support for gays and immensely confusing to the hostile Police Force. 

 

Jim French would surely have approved of such subversion. Apparently, he did not get any Royalties for this use of his image, but as a gay activist, I imagine he would have thought the exposure of the message and accolade of heterosexual approval might have been worth the price.

 

The punk T-shirt project attracted much media interest and controversy, so there must also have been many a closeted gay man who felt heartened by it all, realising for the first time perhaps, that there were other, unquestionably masculine men who, like him, were gay. 

See also this interesting article about the Westwood T Shirt