WHAT: Curator-Led Tour of NEED ME (masks required)

Spanning everything from the early network of body modifiers throughout the United States and Europe, the founding of the first-ever body piercing specific business and magazine, to the artists who made work inspired by the body piercing renaissance, this walkthrough guides viewers through the history, research, and making of NEED ME. This tour will focus on the performance artists Bob Flanagan and Sheree Rose. In honor of the thirty years since Flanagan’s passing, additional objects from Flanagan’s archive will be showcased for the occasion.

This tour is in partnership with the Bob Flanagan Memorial and Marathon Reading, presented by Human Resources and organized by Mae Howard and Sheree Rose. The reading is on Saturday, May 17, 12 - 7 pm, and can be attended in-person at Human Resources, LA, or online via Zoom or live stream. Please refer to the HRLA site for details.

About the exhibition:

NEED ME, or, (de)mystifying the myth of the modern primitive is the first ever public exhibition to present the Western history of body piercing and its roots in queer history. A culmination of years of archival research, NEED ME traces the networks of queer individuals throughout the sexual underground who were essential to modern piercing history through magazines, correspondence, ephemera, and artwork. NEED ME explores icons such as Jim Ward and Fakir Musafar and brings together artworks and artists who contributed to what has been termed the age of the ‘modern primitive.’ Artwork and ephemera by Catherine Opie, Ron Athey, Bob Flanagan & Sheree Rose, Leigh Bowery, Annie Sprinkle, and Efrain Gonzalez illuminate the nuanced and layered drive toward the modern practice of piercing. New works by ONE’s artist-in-residence Noorann Matties provide a haunting intervention on the fraught history of the ‘modern primitive.’ Sculptures by Xandra Ibarra and Panteha Abareshi and a multimedia installation by Angelo Madsen enrich an intergenerational exhibition that foregrounds queer desire, alterity, and community.

About the Curator:

Quetzal Arévalo (they/them) is the Getty Marrow Emerging Professionals Curatorial Assistant at ONE Archives at USC Libraries. They are the curator of NEED ME, or, (de)mystifying the myth of the modern primitive (current), a co-curator of Sci-fi, Magick, Queer L.A.: Sexual Science and the Imagi-Nation (Fall 2024), Robert Andy Coombs: No Content Warning (Summer 2024), and ONE Magazine at 70 (Fall 2023). Before joining ONE Archives at USC Libraries, they graduated from UC Berkeley’s History of Art Department with a departmental citation award and highest university honors. Arévalo’s research investigates the intersections of queer art and subculture within the 20th century.

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