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Loss within Loss:
Artists in the Age of AIDS

Jesse Monteagudo's Book Nook

Loss within Loss: Artists in the Age of AIDS, Edited by Edmund White in cooperation with The Estate Project for Artists with AIDS (A project of the Alliance for the Arts); University of Wisconsin Press, 306 pages; $29.95.

Though the AIDS epidemic was evident in all facets of society, it made its most devastating impact on the arts. Not since the Holocaust have so many talented, artistic people - who were still in their biological and artistic prime - died as a result of a single cataclysm. What musical compositions, books, poems, plays, movies, photos, paintings or statues might have been created if those men and women were allowed to live to an old age?

Even a cursory list of gay writers reminds us of what we lost: Steve Abbott, Reza Abdoh, Hugh Allen, Peter Allen, Frank Arcurt, Reinaldo Arenas, Abel Rios Arias, Howard Ashman, James Assatly, David Craig Austin, Brett Averill - and these are just the A's. I took this list from Patrick Merla's dedication in Boys Like Us, which named 144 "writers lost to AIDS". This does not include non-gay artists, non-literary artists, artists who died after 1996 or artists like James Merrill, whose AIDS-related deaths were only revealed after their demise.

In Loss Within Loss, we remember great and not-so great artists who died of AIDS complications, making the world poorer for their loss. That they are all gay men is no surprise, since gay men make the largest group of AIDS casualties outside of Africa, though the presence of a woman or a nongay man would have been welcome. (It also brings up the old argument about homosexuality and creativity, which I will not go into.)

They range from the truly great - like James Merrill - to the not-so great but still memorable - like Stan Leventhal, whom I met and liked - to notorious (but creative) pains in the butt like David Feinberg. Other artists who are remembered in Loss Within Loss include Howard Brookner, Derek Jarman, Mark Morrisoe, David Wojnarowicz, Paul Monette and Joe Brainard..

The men and women who contributed to Loss Within Loss are as famous as the artists they remember, and include Sarah Schulman, Brad Gooch, Randall Kenan, Felice Picano, Allan Gurganus and Maya Angelou. They write about the artists they knew best: as friends, relatives or lovers.

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Though they love and miss the men they write about, they are also brutally honest, as when Schulman tells us that Leventhal "never really became a great writer"; or when Picano writes about his fellow Violet Quill members Robert Ferro and Michael Grumley. Edmund White, another surviving member of the Violet Quill Club, is the editor of Loss Within Loss, and he puts it all into perspective in an introductory essay: "The American Sublime: Living and Dying as an Artist".

"The essays in this book," notes White, "mark a void - the collapse of a creative world that flourished in the recent past and the end of the promise these gay artists were never able to fulfill." Though nothing will make up for the loss of these great minds and hearts, books like Loss Within Loss will make sure that they are not forgotten.

Loss Within Loss is published in cooperation with the Estate Project for Artists with AIDS, a project of the Alliance for the Arts. It is "a national organization that preserves artworks created by artists living with AIDS, or lost to AIDS." Those interested in knowing more about the Estate Project for Artists with AIDS should consult its Web site: www.artistswithaids.org.

PINS: a novel by Jim Provenzano (Myrminude Press; $14.95), though published in 1999, remained unread by this critic until recently. It is a young adult novel that should appeal to readers of all ages and a sports story that will fascinate readers who (like me) hardly know a thing about competitive sports. It deals with enough topics to fill a book: growing up ethnic (Italian-American), high school sports, teenage homosexuality, the "jock rule", antigay violence, teen suicide and alcohol abuse. We read about these and other matters as we follow the coming of age and coming out of Joey Nicci, who grows and develops through experience and adversity. His periodic name change from Joey to Joseph to Joe is indicative of his development. If there is any justice in the world, PINS will find its way to every gay boy's library - and be made into a "major motion picture".

There is not much that can be said about The Bear Book II: Further Readings in the History and Evolution of a Gay Male Subculture (Harrington Park Press; $24.95) that hasn't been said about its 1997 predecessor, The Bear Book. Editor Les Wright has once again collected scholarly and personal essays about the gay bear phenomenon, by a variety of bears and their friends. Though there is one important essay in this book - "Bears and Health" by Dr. Lawrence D. Mass, which alas reminds us of the many health consequences of being bearishly overweight - most of the articles here come across as leftovers from the first bear book. Needless to say, those who want hot bear porn should look elsewhere: The Bear Book II is for mind and heart and not the groin.

Jesse Monteagudo is a freelance writer who lives in South Florida with his domestic partner. He can be reached at jessemonteagudo@aol.com