Queer Spirits by AA Bronson & Peter Hobbs
8vo. pp. 176. profusely illustrated in colour & b/w. hardcover boards. [New York]: Creative Time & Plug In Editions, [2011].
First Edition.
New.
ISBN-10: 1928570143 / ISBN-13: 9781928570141
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From 2008 to 2010, the artist AA Bronson, formerly of the General Idea collective, and Toronto-based artist and academic Peter Hobbs collaborated to convene small groups of men in various locations (Banff, AL, New Orleans, LA, Winnipeg, ON, Manhattan and Fire Island, NY) in a secret group ritual titled “Invocation of the Queer Spirits.” Invoking the “queer” and marginalized histories of each site in celebrations of sexuality and memorialization, the groups performed something that Bronson has characterized as “a hybrid between group therapy, ceremonial magic, a séance, a circle jerk and a quilting bee.” Queer Spirits explores all five performances in five chapters of photographic essays, primarily by Bronson, together with a brilliant and frequently humorous reflection on queer animals, forest rangers, shamanism and park sex by Peter Hobbs. A series of drawings by Chicago artist Elijah Burgher completes the volume.