spotlight: BOYS! BOYS! BOYS!

We chatted with "French gay boy and gallerist" Ghislain Pascal, the co-founder and director of The Little Black Gallery, and the editor and curator of the new show BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! currently online and showing in person at the Fahey / Klein Gallery in Los Angeles.

[dandy:] What is BOYS! BOYS! BOYS!?
[Pascal:] BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! is a platform I started at The Little Black Gallery to promote queer and gay photographers. I started it because queer and gay photographers are grossly underrepresented in the fine art world, and even more so in the media. BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! is pushing back against this and attempting to make it mainstream by showcasing queer and gay photography in the context of fine art.

What is The Little Black Gallery?
The Little Black Gallery operates as a photography gallery, publisher, and art consultancy – specializing in contemporary photography. I co-founded The Little Black Gallery in 2008, in a gallery space in Chelsea, London for ten years. Today the business doen't have a permanent gallery space. We put on exhibitions worldwide at galleries, museums, art-fairs, and pop-ups- and we manage artists, publish books and magazines, and act as art consultants.

So there are two queer subsections of the business then?
BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! and GIRLS! GIRLS! GIRLS! are two separate platforms that we operate under the umbrella of The Little Black Gallery. BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! now represents more than 67 photographers from 27 countries – including China, India, Iran, Poland, Russia and Turkey, where gay rights are repressed and queer lives are under constant threat. GIRLS! GIRLS! GIRLS! celebrates the female form. We feature photographic legends, contemporary names and rising female photographers.

How long have you been producing queer photography shows?
The first BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! show was in 2018 and since then we've had five auctions with Paddle8, which is now defunct, exhibitions in London, Amsterdam, Cologne and Los Angeles, published two books, launched a bi-annual BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! magazine, and have a fully e-commerce website.

Sounds like you're very busy! What else do you have planned at the moment?
There are always multiple things going on. So we have just launched Volume 2 of our BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! magazine which is currently being distributed worldwide. Of course we have this BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! exhibition with Fahey / Klein Gallery in Los Angeles until 19 June; and we have a new online exhibition every month on BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! June’s exhibition is the stunning show COLORGRAPHY by Domenico Cennamo.

So, what drew you to becoming a queer arts organizer?
After working in the photography world- first as an agent and then a gallerist- it was only a matter of time before my personal taste began to influence my choices.

How do you select the artists for your shows?
I select all my artists based on their work. We are a fine art photography gallery so everything we exhibit or publish has to be seen through the prism of fine art.

Does the work in this show have a general theme?
There is no theme except that it needs to be about BOYS!

How many artists are in this show, and how many total pieces of work are there?
The current show features 14 of our photographers and 7 of theirs, and a total of 46 artworks

Do you end up selling a lot of the work in your shows?
That’s always the aim - this is our first physical exhibition since the pandemic started so fingers crossed.

Anything else you think is important to know about you, the show, or your organization?
It’s really important that people support queer and gay photographers. It may sound cliché but without your support we cannot do it.

BOYS! BOYS! BOYS!, the home of queer and gay photography, can be found at www.boysboysboys.org. The current BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! exhibition is at Fahey / Klein Gallery Los Angeles until June 19.

exhibition website :: boysboysboys.org
gallery website :: faheykleingallery.com
instagram :: @queer_art_photography / @TLBGallery / @FaheyKleinGallery / @Ghislain.Pascal

feature: Kyle Motsinger

issue artist: Joe Klockowski [Woolybearz]

dandyqueerart.com