In 4 Scenes in a Harsh Life (1994), Athey sticks needles into his arm and scalp while describing his heroin addiction and attempted suicide. Raised as a fundamentalist Pentecostal, Athey evokes the spirit/body connection inherent in such traditional martyrs as St. Sebastian. Athey's work has also generated controversy through the use of his own HIV-positive blood in his performances.

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Habeas Corpus (partners Mark McCusker and Darrell Taylor) also centers work on the body and all its functions, metabolic and metaphoric, often augmented and mediated through video and computer technology. In Naked Camera Toss (2001), the duo, joined by audience participants, play a game of catch with a video camera that projects images onto the gallery wall behind them. As the piece evolves, the running, sweating, breathing, and weight of the live bodies is contrasted to the clean, stark, weightless image created by the camera in flight.

Parody and Subversion

As queer artists have embraced the means to communicate to a wider audience, they have also critiqued the power structure maintained by the media. For example, the campy drag king ensemble Backdoor Boys spoof the inherent of popular boy bands. The group croons parodies of bubble-gum pop tunes while stroking their prosthetic penises. Marketed through the popular press and Internet, they have subverted the iconic status of popular media figures.

The ability to be both familiar and foreign is what makes performance art such a powerful tool particularly well suited to the queer community. Performance art is a practice as all encompassing as the community itself.

Many gay and lesbian artists who have defied the legal and social prohibitions against explicit or sympathetic depictions of homosexuality have seen their art censored or suppressed.

Contemporary Art, which designates new currents in art since 1970, is identified with postmodernism; during this period an art addressing gay and lesbian identity emerged.

Expressionist exotic dancer and actress in German silent movies, Anita Berber epitomized for many the decadence of Weimar-era Berlin.

Versatile African-American artist Nayland Blake creates--in a variety of media--work that reflects his preoccupation with his racial and sexual identities.

The music of controversial American composer John Cage contains little autobiographical or gay content, but his ironic emphasis on the importance of silence in music may comment on the imposed silence of the closet.

One of the twentieth-century's most influential dancers and choreographers, Merce Cunningham avoided political statement and self-expression in his work, but his collaborative model may be said to represent a queering of the creative process.

Talented actor and writer John Epperson has had an extremely successful career performing as the glamorous and hilarious drag diva Lypsinka, among other characters.

Lesbian feminist performance artist Holly Hughes has a flair for telling the outrageous stories of everyday lesbian life.

Performance artist Tim Miller presents shows that are rooted in his own life experiences, but that are also a powerful form of glbtq activism.

Charismatic performer and activist Robin Tyler has spent much of her life enmeshed in the struggle for gay and lesbian rights, from planning national marches to promoting same-sex marriage.

Throughout her varied career as a writer, editor, teacher, and performance artist, Terry Wolverton has consistently worked to document glbtq history and increase the visibility of the community.