Olaf [Odegaard]

I think the single most identifying mark of Olaf's work was his fascination with Satyrs and mythical creatures. Olaf explains in his book, "Beasts and Beauties" the reason he focused on Satyrs in many of his drawings and paintings: "In the seventies, I saw the Satyr as the perfect symbol of gay men in that period. In Greek myth, satyrs bring joy and love into the lives of men."

Olaf was capable of capturing the sensuality and power of a man, no matter what setting he chose to put them in, and that's one of the things I particularly like about his art:

"I praise the beauty of masculine men in my art, of their grace, of the passion of their sexuality. Of the peaks and valleys of their fleshscape. Of their raw power. Of their gentle kindness. Of love between men. Of their hardness of body, the wealth of hair on their chest and bodies, of their sense of companionship."

-- from Beasts & Beauties: The Erotic Art of Olaf


Enjoy!


Note: Click on the images to see the full sized pictures.

Temptation

Idyll

Plugged

The Drifter

The Coach

Satyrs

Western Suite

Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

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Olaf's Self Portrait
(Click to enlarge.)


Olaf's art at the Erotic Art Collection:
The Art of Olaf
The Explicit Art of Olaf
Autobiography: from Beasts & Beauties: The Erotic Art of Olaf

Olaf's HOMni Galleries:
Olaf [Odegaard]
Olaf [Odegaard] XXX

Rein Mets' Olaf Page

The Leslie-Lohman Collection's Olaf art
scroll down to the second row

Uncut Rainbow's Olaf Collection

H.A.M.'s Olaf Room




(Click to enlarge.)
Olaf's book Beasts and Beauties can be found here.


Olaf Odegaard's Obituary
(from the Tom of Finland Foundation's Newsletter: The Dispatch)



All images © Olaf Odegaard.
I just admire the art.

Xavier Gicquel

Xavier Gicquel favors rugged men, big and hairy, often with huge, oversized cocks. They're blue collar, working men: mechanics, plumbers, construction workers, truck drivers, cops, military men. And when they play, they play in Dungeons, the back rooms of bars and men's latrines - the sex rough and kinky, full of leather and rubber, bondage, fisting and watersports.

But despite the broad strokes with which Gicquel paints his men, they are not all stereotypes. You're just as likely to find a big, hairy guy wearing a leather collar and lead holding a puppy in his arms, or a man in leather chaps and a hairy ass with a string of pearls around his neck. His first book, produced in 2006, was titled "Rough n' Queeny" and it seems a rather accurate description of his art.

Gicquel started out as an illustrator for fashion design, and you can see those roots when you look closely at his art. It's there in the design of the wallpaper some guy is getting fucked up against, the intricate detail of a biker's tattoo or the bricks in the wall of the backroom of some grungy bar. His colors are bright and in your face, and his subject matter runs the gamut of sexuality. Pretty much the only thing you won't find in his work are twinks. That's not his style.

Enjoy!


Note: Click on the images to see the full sized pictures.

Bear in Red Shorts

Army and Navy

Le Videur
(The Bouncer)

Hot Dog - or -
What's the Best in French Police

The Dungeon

Cowboy Boots

Paradis Perdu (Paradise Lost Series):
A la recherche du temps perdu
("Remembrance of Things Past")

Masturbango

Back of the Bar

Leather and Pearls

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Website: Xavier Gicquel Illustrateur

More Artwork: Triangulere Artist's Galerie - Xavier Gucquel
(Trianqulere is an annual French publication focusing on gay culture.)

Note: You can use Google Translate to get an automatic translation of the above, or any, webpages. They aren't the best translations, but you can usually sort it out if you put a little thought into it.

I found most of his art at those two sites, but there were a few other places with some good sized pieces of art and decent but short articles about Gicquel, as well as one interview that is probably much better in the native French, but still gives some interesting insight to the artist and the man.

Art:

Tom of Finland Foundation's Art Gallery: here and here.

The Queer Art Blog: Fag and Fuck, New Exhibition, Rough n' Queeny

The Gay Comics List: Rough n' Queeny

Interview:

Zoneros: Xavier Gicquel
(a rough translation)

His Book:

Rough n' Queeny

On March 31, 2007 the French Rubber Club Mec En Caoutchouc (M.E.C.) held their second annual Rubber Contest. Four men competed for the title and when the results were tallied, the winner was Xavier Gicquel. For more on this event you can view their April 2007 newsletter in pdf form.

All images © Xavier Gicquel.
I just admire the art.

Hector Silva

Hector Silva has been drawing the homeboys of East LA for twenty years, now. But he doesn't draw just any homeboys - he draws the queer ones, which suits me perfectly. His style is photorealistic, and absolutely stunning - drawn in black and white with occasional bold splashes of color. And his choice of subject matter pushes the edges, and challenges misconceptions.

Reading his interviews in preparation for this post, I was struck by his insistence that keeping a distance between edgy, controversial art and the acceptance of the mainstream is a necessary part of keeping erotic art real. "The cultural space carved out by proponents of erotic art is a place where the obscene and the perverse don't have to ask for permission. I put a high value on that space." - Frontiers Magazine

Wow. I think that quote belongs at the top of this blog.


Note: Click on the images to see the full sized pictures.

BJ #4

My Homeboys (jay papi!)

Latino Power #2

Miguel Angel

Rope

Latino Power #1

What Jaime Saw at the Park

FF #3

El bautismo

My Homeboys (w/red hanky)

BJ #1

Showers of Gold

BJ #2

Man at Work

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His website: The Art Works of Hector Silva

His MySpace: Hector Silva

I found a few pieces of his art on the Tom of Finland Foundation's site - all of which I've posted here. But other than that, I found only individual pieces here and there. Most everything else came from his site, or his press - so I don't have any other links to his art. If you have any to add, please let me know.


I really like Hector Silva. I like his style, I like his attitude, I like the way thinks. I just like him. But since this blog is all about the art, and not about personalities and politics, I'll leave you links to his interviews and articles, and you can check them out if you're interested.

Articles on Hector Silva:

Brown Man's Dilemma: "Hector has given gay brown men power through his art."
(blog of DeadLee, a gay Latino Hip Hop artist)

Frontiers Magazine interview
(For some reason, the interviewer had an agenda of his own, which he tried to push on Silva. I love the way Silva just refused to be led, and kept to his own beliefs.)

Bullfighter's Cafe article

There are more articles in the Press section of Silva's site.


Upcoming event:

If anyone is going to be in LA in the next month or so - between April 12th and May 20, 2008 - there will be a retrospective of his art at the One National Gay and Lesbian Archives entitled Visions and Voices.



Enjoy!


All images © Hector Silva.
I just admire the art.