Share
Queer Ventennio; Italian Fascism, Homoerotic Art, and the Nonmodern in the Modern (34) (Italian Modernities) (in English)
John Champagne (Author)
·
Peter Lang Uk
· Paperback
Queer Ventennio; Italian Fascism, Homoerotic Art, and the Nonmodern in the Modern (34) (Italian Modernities) (in English) - John Champagne
$ 78.00
$ 97.50
You save: $ 19.50
Choose the list to add your product or create one New List
✓ Product added successfully to the Wishlist.
Go to My WishlistsIt will be shipped from our warehouse between
Monday, July 01 and
Tuesday, July 02.
You will receive it anywhere in United States between 1 and 3 business days after shipment.
Synopsis "Queer Ventennio; Italian Fascism, Homoerotic Art, and the Nonmodern in the Modern (34) (Italian Modernities) (in English)"
Given fascist proscriptions against homosexuality, a surprising number of artists under Mussolini's regime were queer. Exploring the contribution of Italy to our understanding of both the history of homosexuality and European modernism, this ground-breaking study analyses three queer modernists - writer Giovanni Comisso, painter and writer Filippo de Pisis, and painter Corrado Cagli. None self-identified as fascists; none, however, were consistent critics of the regime. All understood their own sexuality via the idea of the primitive - a discourse fascism also employed in its efforts to secure consent for the dictatorship. What happens when we return to these men and their work minus the assumption that our most urgent task is identifying their fascist tendencies or political quietism? Variously infantilized, pathologized, marginalized, and stigmatized, treated as both cause and effect of fascism, queer ventennio artists are an easy target, not brave or selfless or savvy enough to see their common struggle with fascism's other victims. Revisiting their works and lives with an eye toward neither rehabilitation nor condemnation allows us to ponder more carefully the relationship between art and politics, how homophobia has structured art criticism, the need to further bring queer perspectives to Italian cultural analysis, and how such men disrupt our sense of modern homo/heterosexual definition.