LGBTQ Visibility: Art and Literature from 1930-1955

LGBTQ Visibility: Art and Literature from 1930-1955

Images and correspondence pulled from the Charles Henri Ford and Parker Tyler Collections at the Harry Ransom Center.

View magazine, published from 1940-1947, is a ‘little magazine’ edited and curated by Charles Henri Ford, Parker Tyler and Max Ernst, and can be found in its entirety in the Parker Tyler Collection at the Harry Ransom Center. View features submissions by contemporary giants such as Gertrude Stein, Salvador Dali, Georgia O'Keeffe, Marcel Duchamp...etc., but it also features a huge selection of queer artists who dominated the NYC scene such as George Platt Lynes, Lionel Abel, Parker Tyler...etc. Despite what many LGBTQ histories would have you believe, in the half century before the beginning of the Second World War, New York City was home to a thriving and highly visible gay community who dominated the avant-garde scene. While many narratives portray queer communities pre-Stonewall as closeted and divided, LGBTQ culture and politics has a deeply saturated history that defies that misconception. View magazine allows us first hand insight into the actual avant-garde scene of the 1940s, unfiltered by scholars and secondary literature influenced by the homophobia of the 80s and 90s. Furthermore, View proves the visibility and collectivity of the NYC gay scene, disbarring the notion that the LGBTQ community was scattered and afraid before the Stonewall riots.

Zoe Roden

1930-1955

English

Little Magazine and Correspondence