Artist Spotlight: Dan Nicoletta

Harvey Milk on Election Night

Dan Nicoletta began his career as a freelance photographer in 1975 as an intern to Crawford Barton, who was then the staff photographer for The Advocate. Dan also worked in Harvey Milk’s camera store in the heart of the burgeoning LGBT mecca in the Castro district and was also involved in Milk’s election to the city's board of supervisors, which made him one of the first openly gay elected officials in the world. Nicoletta’s photographic work maps his enduring romance with San Francisco and its people, especially the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender populations, and he remains a key point person for LGBT-related research.

Nicoletta’s work has been featured in numerous settings, including the Academy Award–winning film Milk by Gus Van Sant, the Academy Award–winning documentary The Times of Harvey Milk by Rob Epstein and Richard Schmiechen, and the award-winning documentary Sex Is by Marc Huestis and Lawrence Helman.

Dan’s work has also appeared in numerous periodicals and books, including Randy Shilts’s The Mayor of Castro Street, Susan Stryker and Jim Van Buskirk’s Gay by the Bay, and Harold Evans’s The American Century and also the 10-year anniversary catalog Out at the Library: Celebrating the James C. Hormel Gay and Lesbian Center.