John Thomas Paradiso
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Samuel Steward-Ohio Star, 2016
 
Samuel Steward-Ohio Star, 2016     

Paper Quilt Series (current)

Samuel Steward-Ohio Star, 2016, 86" x 56" x 2 "

Hand carved found wood headboard with oil, Ink jet print on paper collaged and machine sewn for detail, varnish and acrylic on wood panels. (Twenty-five 10" wood panels) Paper Quilt Series

I was inspired to create “Samuel Steward - Ohio Star”, after reading the biography “Secret Historian: The Life and Times of Samuel Steward, Professor, Tattoo Artist, and Sexual Renegade” by Justin Spring. 

Samuel Steward (July 23, 1909 – December 31, 1993), also known as Phil Andros, Phil Sparrow, and many other pseudonyms, was a poet, novelist, and university professor who left the world of academia to become a tattoo artist and pornographer. 

Steward was fortunate to meet another sexual hero, sex researcher Alfred Kinsey and he became an unofficial collaborator with the Kinsey’s Institute for Sex Research. He donated his lifelong sexual records with photographs, original drawings, paintings, and decorative objects to the Institute. I am fortunate to have a piece of my art in the same Kinsey Collection.

I am particularly inspired that throughout his life, Steward extensively chronicled the sex he had with men. I feel a kinship to Steward, as in my early years making art, although for different reasons, I visually chronicled my sex life with men.

To honor Samuel Steward, I put his portrait in the center of the center square. I placed my self-portrait to the right of Steward to memorialize the connection I feel to him.  My use of the Ohio Star pattern is in honor of where Samuel Steward was born and raised. I manipulate appropriated images of men from gay male pornography to further honor Steward’s role with gay erotica. 

 

Proceed with Caution, 2019
Samuel Steward-Ohio Star, 2016
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