Photo of “Patrick” by McKenzie Adkins from eastvillageboys.com
“I don’t work out and I don’t really watch what I eat,” David says. “When they actually wanted to shoot me and I saw who I’d be put up next to, it was complete 100 percent ego. If they want me on the site next to all these other model boys, I’ll do it. It’s kind of a ‘fuck you’ to all the other gay sites.” Indeed, despite the site’s focus on a different look than most other gay websites, David was flattered because it was also a site that he himself would read. “There are not too many places online or in print where you can get really good investigative work or see local artists’ work.”
I’ll admit it: I like to look. Maybe I’m a freak, or just more honest than many, but as both a producer and consumer of erotica, I find an undeniable pleasure in seeing and being seen. In these days of media saturation and ubiquitous sexy imagery, it’s hard for anyone, gay or straight, male or female, not to participate in this fracas.
I discovered eastvillageboys.com when a friend sent a mass text message, appended with a sheepish “LOL,” alerting everyone of his semi-nude modeling debut. I logged on to see a new version of the soft-spoken, hardworking Southern boy; there he was, vamping for the camera, his shyness transformed into a coy come-hither stare as he reveled in his newfound freedom from pants. Scrolling past the photos of lithe boys in various stages of undress, I found interviews with up-andcoming artists, musicians and designers.There was a profile on the life of a gay trucker, and photographs of Harvey Milk’s San Francisco. I was hooked.You might not believe it, but I was reading it for the articles.
Over pints of Stella at Heathers, a bar off of Avenue B, the site’s masterminds, longtime friends Richard Welch and Weston Bingham, are talking about their creation. London transplant Welch is bolder, brasher, his potty mouth a charming juxtaposition with his impeccable Queen’s English. He has modeled nude in the past and says he’d have no problem posing for the site now. Bingham, who prefers to keep his privates private, comes off slightly more reserved.The guys are as into urbanity as they are sex, hence the site’s tagline of “cock culture,” denoting equal parts smarts and smut.
“The boys that we have on there, they sort of exist as the low-culture pin-up boys,” Bingham says. “It provides a good mix, having serious discussions without forgetting that we like to look at pictures of naked boys.”
The same theory, after all, has worked for Playboy. “When you read a newspaper, the most successful ones combine high and low culture,” adds Welch. “I don’t think most American newspapers do it well it all, but if you look at something like The Guardian, it’s serious but they also recognize that you want a little bit of everything and I think that’s kind of where we are...people come to the site for the cock, but they stay for the culture.”
This is also true of queer zines like Butt and its progenitors; one can read pages of toothsome articles before ever encountering the zine’s namesake. I comment on similarities with such outlets, and Bingham says they “weren’t trying to make it look like a zine,” but the site “happens to look like one because we’re using tools at their most basic level... it’s about the content, and the structure is about carrying that content.” However, he notes, the underlying idea is different; while Butt is about “repositioning the male body,” East Village Boys is more interested in “informing the way gay culture and [the] gay community is defined.”
I comment on the artistic, soft-core nature of the photos—as David says, “they don’t come across sexual, they definitely comes across as intimate”—and ask if there’s any point discussing the difference between art and porn. Is it porn if it gives you a boner?
“I think a lot of art can give you a pretty good boner,” begins Welch.
“And
a lot of porn definitely doesn’t,” finishes Bingham.
Of course, part of
the site’s appeal is its perceived East Village aesthetic. Scrawnier
than Chelsea Boys but without the by-7inch, I-mean-a-record vibe of
Williamsburg’s gay scene, the guys of East Village Boys epitomize the
mythologized starving artist beauty of the neighborhood. “If you look
at the way that we write, beyond fetishizing a name and a location,
there’s little you can know about [the models],” says Welch. Absent any
context, the viewer projects personal fantasies onto the nubile youths
on the screen.
“What’s inherently gay about a picture of a naked guy?” I ask, instantly realizing the question is rhetorical.The theme is in the eye of the beholder; if all of the contributors or viewers were women, it would take on a much different label. It interests me that there are straight guys out there who enjoy posing knowing most of the people looking will be men. “It’s very much an individual thing,”Welch says. “It’s not definable by sexuality at all.”
At the end of the day, though, East Village Boys is primarily a gay-themed site. Judging from who signs up for the mailing list, most of its readership is male, with hits from such diverse places as the U.K., France, Germany, Spain, Australia, Brazil and Iraq. Almost two years old now, the site was “born somewhat out of a desire to see an outlet for a gay-oriented publication that represented gay people that happen to be gay...it’s not their be all and end all,” Bingham says. “They are a graphic designer, an artist, someone who works in a bar...but they love cock.”
I remark that it’s important to
show gay youth they can grow up to be whatever they like, despite
narrow stereotypes depicted on television. “We felt gay culture had
become so staid,” responds Welch, “it’s all about pumping house music
and drugs...gay culture used to be a countercultural force.That still
exists, but the mainstreaming of it has really dumbed it down.The
struggle it creates is a real germinator of creativity.”
And
that’s where the East Village part comes in. “It’s about the larger
idea of the East Village,” says Bingham. “Everyone who lives in New York
knows the East Village as what it was in the 1970s or ’80s, [as] where
Basquiat started, and Television and the Voidoids. It was a real center
of creativity that got cut short primarily because of AIDS in the mid
‘80s and then gentrification.What’s great about the East Village is
that it anchors us in a place that everybody understands and gives us
free reign to explore it as an idea, and not as a region.”
Indeed,
the East Village we carry in our hearts has been cooler than the actual
neighborhood for a number of years.That also answers my question of how
all those willowy young men can afford to live there: Most of them
don’t. “If one looks at the mythology of the East Village it was always
the countercultural force,”Welch continues. “Gay culture, especially
nightlife, was a little more alternative.” It’s art versus
product, homo-punk versus club drugs.Welch and Bingham don’t denigrate
techno music, tight T-shirts or even crystal meth; they just don’t find
them very interesting.They’d rather talk to transgressive artists like
G.B. Jones, founder of J.D.s, the early queercore zine run by
Bruce LaBruce, and frontwoman of post punk band Fifth Column; and
Scooter LaForge, whose beautifully twisted paintings combine storybook
imagery with leather daddy boots and water sports.
In that
vein, they like to keep it DIY.The site is not a commercial venture;
there are no ads, no sponsors and Welch and Bingham have actually lost
money on it thus far. However, they aren’t opposed to taking on
advertisers in the future, provided they fit the audience. “It would be
great to pay the contributors,” says Welch. “They work really hard and
we greatly appreciate it.”They’re also putting out three physical
monographs later this year featuring photographers they’ve worked with;
in each case, it will be the artist’s first book.
The site “was meant to support the grassroots, up and coming artists,” says Welch, adding that they’ve wanted to do monographs from the start.They’ll act as an independent publisher, teaming up only with distributors to release the volumes.They currently sell limited edition T-shirts by Scooter LaForge, and plan to open a gallery somewhere downtown and on the East Side. Come spring, they’ll start throwing bashes at an as yet undetermined downtown location. Given the diversity of ages, orientations and geographical origins of the models and artists, it’s anyone’s guess what the first fte will look like. “We’ll see it actually come to life,” grins Bingham. “It should be an interesting party.”
And for plenty of people on the other side of the computer screen, it already is.
A Pose is a Pose is a Pose
No matter what you look like, you could probably look better naked. And if you’re sending out photos of your birthday suit, you should definitely care to send the best. In honor of the work done by the folks at EastVillageBoys.com, we’ve consulted with some of the finest shutterbugs in the skin trade to find out how to make your nudie pics pop no matter how bad your camera skills may be.
“Daylight is always very flattering. Put your best asset forward: whether it’s your ass, your dick or your hair. Semi-hard is the best if you’re going to be naked or in underwear, because a hard dick can be too much in your face, and a soft one can be disappointing. In terms of arm positions, if you photograph yourself with your arms up, it makes it look like you have a Vshaped torso.You have to raise your arms.” — Felix Burrichter, BUTT magazine
“Use dramatic lighting, try lighting one light, above you off to one side.The light source should be off camera—this will help to hide any imperfections but still appear sexy. Don’t use flash! Oil your whole body.This will also make you appear sexier, especially since there’s no flash. But don’t use it if you’re got a hairy chest, it will make your hair curl up and stick together. Be confident. It comes through in the photo. If you want to appear aggressive, then look into the camera, pretend the photographer is your lover and inhabit that role. It really shows up in the end.” — Pearl Gabel, photographer
