Divas of San Francisco: Portraits of Transgender Women

Sat, Jun 3
7-midnight
Free, donations gratefully accepted

DIVAS OF SAN FRANCISCO: opening show and party

Divas of San Francisco: Portraits of Transgender Women is CSC's June
gallery show. Photos by by David Steinberg, with gallery hours every
Weds. in June, 5 -- 7 pm, and by arrangement. At the Center for Sex
and Culture, 398 11th Street (at Harrison, 3rd floor), San Francisco.
The opening reception and party features performances by women in the
photographs: transgender women from Divas Nightclub and Bar, San
Francisco's predominant transgender club. Donations gratefully
accepted, no one turned away for lack of funds.

Avoiding the superficial representations of transgender people that
dominate the mass media, "Divas of San Francisco" offers instead a
revealing look at the complexity, diversity, and fierce integrity of
the transgender women who frequent Divas -- topless dancers,
bartenders, lip-synch performers, disc jockeys, regulars, and
sporadic visitors -- a group that spans a broad spectrum of ages,
body types, ethnic and economic backgrounds, lifestyles, sexual
orientations, and gender identifications. Steinberg's photographs
range from the demure to the erotic, from introspective moments to
flamboyant on-stage performance. They include the glamour and
emphatic sexual appeal central to many women at Divas while reaching
beyond personal appearance to show the personalities, spirit, and
striking personal presence of their subjects. Collectively, the
photos in "Divas of San Francisco" provide an intimate and strikingly
personal look at a remarkable group of transgender women -- their joy
and their sadness, their strength and their uncertainty, their grace
and their awkwardness, their toughness and their vulnerability.

Steinberg has been photographing transgender women at Divas since
1997, and has been the de facto house photographer there since 2002.
Initially limited to photographing dancers on stage, Steinberg was
later able to photograph dancers backstage, and to photograph both
dancers and other women from Divas extensively at their homes and at
his studio. CSC is happy to host the first public exhibition of this
body of work, which will subsequently be exhibited at the Santa Cruz
Diversity Center and at Seattle's Benham Gallery. In addition to his
photography, David Steinberg writes extensively about the culture and
politics of sex and gender issues. His Comes Naturally column, now in
its 15th year, is distributed online to over 3000 subscribers
worldwide. His books include Photo Sex: Fine Art Sexual Photography
Comes of Age; Erotic by Nature: A Celebration of Life, of Love, and
of Our Wonderful Bodies; and The Erotic Impulse: Honoring the Sensual
Self.

Gallery hours for David Steinberg's photo show: Every Weds in June,
5-7 pm. Also Sat., 6/17, 1-5 pm. And by appointment.

Venue:

Center for Sex & Culture
398 11th Street
San Francisco
415 255-1155
http://www.sexandculture.org

Additional Info: