100 TOM Art Festival Photos in Honor of Tom’s 100th Birthday

Gio, Durk, and BJ

As we continue to build the virtual space for the 25th Annual Tom of Finland Art & Culture Festival, we are reminiscing on times spent in person with you all. We celebrate with a fixed idea on LGBTQ+ art and Tom’s 100th birthday.

Tom of Finland Foundation (ToFF) is proud to announce its 25th Art & Culture Festival: Plugged In. This year’s Festival will be hosted on a custom website, starting the second weekend of this month: December 11, 12, and 13, 2020. tinyurl.com/tofARTfair

The Festival is one of the key public events the Foundation does each year and 2020 is also the 36th anniversary of Tom of Finland Foundation (ToFF), a Los Angeles-based organization founded by Tom of Finland and Durk Dehner. ToFF’s mission is to protect, preserve, and promote erotic art. The Foundation is located in Echo Park, in TOM House, a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument.

All photographs and imagery ©Rubén Esparza and ©Tom of Finland unless noted.

Rick’s Blue Magazines

FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS:

Announcements of the 2020 Tom of Finland Emerging Artist Competition winners and the 2020 Tom of Finland Foundation Awards recipients.

Life Drawing Session with Miguel Angel Reyes

Plugged-In Panels include:

• History of Leather and Fetish Talk with Durk Dehner and special guests including Jon Wright and John McConnell

• Artist's Corner: Queer Art Practices with Rubén Esparza and Jordan Green, speaking with BlackManWhiteBaby, Brontez Purnell, Suzanne Shifflett, Seosamh "Joe" Lily, Anka Connolley, and Vicente Urgatechea

• Overlaps: Art + Identity + Activism with Ron Athey, Cassils, and rafa esparza, presented by Rubén Esparza

• Around The World With Tom's Men with Stuart Sandford, Brontez Purnell, Slava Mogutin, and Matt Lambert, with Durk Dehner and Richard Villani

• DJ sets from DJ Kita and Danny Lethal

• Spoken word by Steven Reigns

• Performances and video playlists featuring artists ¿La Pregunta?, Aimee Goguen, BlackManWhiteBaby, Brontez Purnell, Bruce LaBruce, Candy Pain, Dynasty Handbag, Emily Lucid, Heldáy de la Cruz, Candy Pain, Josh Paul Thomas, Lior Shamriz, Christian Coll, Peter Kalisch, Marval Rex, Ron Athey, Seosamh "Joe" Lily, Seth Bogart, Slava Mogutin, Sob Sister, David Andrew Torres, and more.

• This digital Festival aims to support artists by providing them an avenue to present and sell their works. The Festival will feature artist “booths” and virtual events throughout the weekend. Attendees can connect with artists, see performances, watch video installations, draw, and listen to panel discussions.

COMING TOGETHER as a community is vital for us. We have weathered many storms together: The devastation of HIV/AIDS, the many ways our lives have been limited and our work discriminated against, and now the experience of great SOCIAL CHANGE occurring with physical isolation. We long for spaces to express, to share, and to experience art.

Forging new digital territories, embracing glitches + fails. We QUEER FOLK know all too well glitches + fails. All this and more, as we inch forward towards a QUEER UTOPIA.

All photographs and imagery ©Rubén Esparza and ©Tom of Finland unless noted.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tomoffinlandfoundation/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ruben__esparza
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TomsFoundation
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ToFFHouse
Facebook Event Page: https://fb.me/e/cPDBe7zwg
Link to Festival: tinyurl.com/tofARTfair