Artist Spotlight Del LaGrace Volcano

Gender variant, gender abolitionist, gender terrorist — these are a few terms to describe Del LaGrace Volcano and the photographs work s/He produces.

“My intention is to explode the notion of the truthful body,” says Volcano. “My work demonstrates how physiological sex is every bit as much of a cultural construct as gender. Although we all know that the relationship between a photograph and the truth is unreliable at best, we still want to believe what our eyes tell us.”

A pioneer of LGBT photography, Volcano’s work undercuts assumptions about the legibility of gender. Volcano is widely celebrated as a significant figure at the center of a conversation about the body, gender and sexuality. Volcano's book Love Bites, was one of the first of photos of lesbian sexuality, it caused a huge uproar for the edgy imagery, and is still considered a classic. In a survey of portraits and self-portraits, Volcano, with disarming frankness, charts the often complicated relationship between physical transformation and shifting identifications.

Del LaGrace Volcano: A Mid-Career Retrospective, the first U.S. museum exhibition of Volcano’s 30-year career is set for September 19 - November 11 at The Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art with an opening reception Wednesday, September 19, 6-8 p.m.

For more information on the exhibit, go here.
For more about Volcano, go here.