Bars

Through the bars of a brass bed, we witness the scene. Yet through the bars, the window exposes the open night sky with infinite space. Perhaps this symbolizes their hearts, their mind? A dream of freedom?

2019 Leslie Peterson Sapp Bars 16x20

This is inspired by a movie scene, but I changed the room, positions and the genders. My original idea was to have the person in the foreground have an ambiguous gender but is didn’t work out, so ah well! Depicting same sex drama intrigue is something I have done a lot of, but this is the most explicit image I have done. My work is set in the past, so the story I have in my head is that these men are forced to meet secretly in a clandestine manner. We view them through the headboard of a brass bed, so that we see the headboard and the footboard. The bed forms series of interlocking bars fencing them in. This is symbolic of the jail societal rules place them in, enclosing and restraining them. Bars is also a reference to drinking establishments, which was one of the only places queer folk used to be able to find one another. 

This is a bitty video where I talk about "Bars" at my opening at RiverSea Gallery. I discuss the inspiration behind the imagery.