Die Kränken at
ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives

Die Kränken, Black Pipe Intervention (Video still) (2016). Image courtesy of the artist and ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the USC Libraries.

A form of nostalgia pervades artist collective die Kränken’s multifaceted exhibition Sprayed with Tears, currently on view at ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives. Its accompanying text states die Kränken (“the sick” in German) “strives for new strategies of queer radicality”—yet, their exhibition is surprisingly dedicated to the past. Sprayed with Tears centers mostly on the history of the Blue Max, a Southern California gay motorcycle club, and their fetishistic garb, ritualized performances, and subcultural codes.

Dominating the downstairs portion of the exhibition is a projection of die Kränken’s captivating reinterpretation of Blue Max’s annual performance. Installed opposite is a decorated bar that serves as an approximation of the Black Pipe, a now-defunct leather bar, and subject of frequent LAPD raids. Illuminating archival biker footage and multiple framed prints round out the installation. The second story mezzanine is dedicated to a suite of 16 adroitly designed bandanas that contemporize the hanky code, an antiquated means of signaling to others, precisely what your kink is via colored handkerchiefs.

That these emblems are of a gay male identity that is either bygone or evaporating as a result of homosexual assimilation into heteronormative society is of apparent frustration for die Kränken. However, their reevaluation here seems less an attempt at actual resuscitation than a stopgap measure against total erosion of certain gay lifestyles. As such, Sprayed with Tears functions more as a self-conscious throwback during an era of widespread gay visibility, and suggests that this very visibility will eventually be a corrosive force for queer subcultures. While die Kränken’s retooling of gay motorcycle club activities sheds light on prior homosexual appropriation of a straight counterculture, it doesn’t assertively suggest what such a model should be today—leaving one asking when does fetishized nostalgia end and new queer radicality begin?

Die Kränken: Sprayed with Tears runs February 11–April 8, 2017 at at ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives (909 West Adams Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90007).

Die Kränken, Sprayed with Tears (Video Still) (2016). Image courtesy of the artist and ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the USC Libraries.

Motorcycle club members in daisy costumes in front of Buddy Motorcycle Club Greek temple readying for the St. Patrick’s Day Motorcycle Run, Bloody Mary Party, and Carnival of Spring (1969). Image courtesy of the Blue Max Motorcycle Club Records at ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the USC Libraries.

Blue Max MC member (undated). Image courtesy of the Blue Max Motorcycle Club Records at ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the USC Libraries.

Five Blue Max Motorcycle Club members in uniform jackets and Pickelhauben helmets seated on Harley Davidson Electra Glide motorcycles at curb in Glendale, California (1970). Image courtesy of the Blue Max Motorcycle Club Records at ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the USC Libraries.

Thomas Duncan is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Art History at UCLA. He is currently at work on his dissertation, “’The Right Bad Picture’: Failure and Relationality in Andy Warhol’s Photography, 1969­–1979″.

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