Neal Baer Collection

Jean Genet Masturbating in Metteray Prison is an early Wojnarowicz work and one of the first to incorporate a stenciled stamp image, something which linked him to the graffiti scene at the time (he would also spray-paint stenciled images to sides of buildings) as well as to Andy Warhol’s screenprinting process. The subject refers to Genet’s novel Our Lady of the Flowers, first published in 1943 and which chronicled a man’s experiences in the Parisian homosexual community, recounted in stories he wrote while passing his prison sentence. The stories are highly erotic and produced to help the protagonist masturbate in prison. Genet wrote the novel while he himself was imprisoned on a particular kind of brown paper given by prison authorities, which inspired Wojnrowicz to print some of the images in this series on brown paper. The stencil image forms a particularly important emblem for Wojnarowicz and was repeatedly used in his other works, such as in his supermarket poster series.

David Wojnorowicz (1954-1992) was born in New Jersey and left his family home as a teenager to work as a street hustler in New York. He incorporated his lived experience of New York as an openly gay man diagnosed with AIDS, as well as his political activism and critique of American consumer culture, into a diverse practice of writing, paintings, photography, sculpture, film and performance. Peter Hujar, also represented in the collection, was a significant mentor and friend to Wojnarowicz after their brief romance in 1981. “Everything I made,” Wojnarowicz said, “I made for Peter.”

Wojnarowicz died of AIDS in 1992.

Provenance
Phillips New York, Lot 378, 19 October 2021

See also
Jean Genet, Our Lady of the Flowers via Wikipedia

David Wojnarowicz via Wikipedia

David Wojnarowicz in the collection of the MoMA

David Wojnarowicz in the collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art

“David Wojnarowicz: History Keeps Me Awake At Night,” Whitney Museum of American Art, 14 July – 30 September 2018

Richard Brody, “Wojnarowicz,” Reviewed: A Discerning and Tragic Vision of the Artist and His Times,” The New Yorker, March 19, 2021

Christine Smallwood, “The Rage and Tenderness of David Wojnarowicz’s Art,” The New York Times, September 7, 2018

Peter Hujar, Darrel Ellis (III) (1981)

Peter Hujar, Paul Thek Showering, Fire Island (1966)