Rex Verboten!

Dust Jacket — Bob Mainardi

Where does one place Rex in the pantheon of gay artists? First, let's drop the "gay." While he is one of the foremost artists of forbidden and politically incorrect sexual activity among men, his is more than merely "gay art." Rex the artist is a historian, a voyeur, a muckraker and a trouble maker, a provocateur, a sensualist and a hedonist, the sensitive and observant portrayer of a secret world, and a dirty old man (who looks remarkably good for his age). The world of leather and denim, steamy basements and grimy garages, anonymous sweaty tops and groveling sexslave is perfectly suited to his black & white detailed and moody pointillistic renderings. While there have been many other artists who have mastered fine rendering in pen and ink (Virgil Finlay, Franklin Booth), no modern artist has brought together a unique subject and style quite as successfully as Rex.

"Back Room" — Bo Tobin Anacabe

An Essay on International REXpresentation

In the backroom, the basement, the blackened booths at the 'bookstore,' and the blind alley at 3 a.m.—light, darkness and shadow mix and mingle, reflect and retreat, like a flickering projector playing film noir. This is no place for children, or debutantes, or high-class ladies in search of the next Jackson Pollock. If you find an art critic here, he's not going to give you his real name or say where he works. In this place without business suites, where criminals, vampires and man-eating beasts go to feed, danger mixes with excitement, and risk finds its reward. This is the underworld landscape in which REX draws his sustenance and sups his inspiration.

The headline read "Controversy Disrupts Mayor's Art Gala," and opening the San Francisco Chronicle, late in the afternoon in 1985, REX had no reason to read any further. He did not need to attend the event to know who they were talking about, or guess what might have happened. When he received the letter from the Mayor's office, congratulating him for being selected as one of San Francisco's 100 Most Influential Artists, he knew down to his core, that it was not going to end well. If REX had a middle name, it would begin with a C, because 'controversy' has followed him most of his life.

The piece in question, "DOORBEATS," is not included in this collection. The subject matter remains the purview of the plain brown envelope that follows the signed statement of consent. In the three months it took him to create the work—dot by dot, millimeter by millimeter, he never imagined that it would grace the walls of a gallery, or sit in the spotlight of a studio or salon, or even eventually end up here, catalogued in this coffee-table book. His meticulous, almost obsessive construction of this well-regarded piece of pornography without penetration was intended to be appreciated in a toilet, or pinned to a wall of a shed where a man goes when he needs ten minutes alone with his thoughts and his left hand, or hidden under the mattress in that same plain brown envelope it came in, now spotted with human stains.

The "art world" has always had its Rembrandts, Warhols, and Jasper Johns who create art solely in hope of financial success and public adoration, and there are those who refuse to believe any artist would shun media recognition, because they would rather be spending through the soiled streets of the Tenderloin with Old Reliable's deviant director David Hurles or waxing philosophic with a Maddog tattooist like the queer artist Robert Sobrey. They might even point to the iconic commercial work that REX has done for New York's notorious MINESHAFT and L.U.R.E. or San Francisco's seminal Taste of Leather and LONESTAR Saloon as evidence of corporate corruption, because they do not know his story or understand how these "public works" afford him the time to focus on his own visions in private.

The gay writers and journalists who have sought to interview him often share the same specific questions about his early years, the crucial points in his youth and development that turned his inimitable technical genius to such sleazy and sordid subject matter. "If they only knew..." he likes to say, followed almost immediately by, "and don't you dare tell them."

He knows that the details of his early years would read like a gay Cinderella story—more suited to self-loathing pulp fiction—an almost magical fantasy that could only overshadow the misery and isolation that spawned it. His is the story of the socially isolated American farm boy who fled the narrow-minded persecution of his small Northeast home town to live on the streets and in the flophouses of New York City in the 1950s, the era of the beatniks. Not far from the Greyhound bus station, where he first arrived, technically a few years short of the age of consent, he was discovered by a famous effete fashion designer who brought him home to his Manhattan penthouse. After two years paying for art school, his gentlemen friend whisked him away to Paris to launch his career as a "child prodigy" of illustration and design in the most notable fashion and travel magazines of those times.

REX knows that gay biographers want to hear about "what it was like" to be surrounded by the world's most renowned fashion designers, artists, models, publishers, ballet dancers and diplomats who shared a secret language in a time before "Gay Culture" had

When these same would-be historians want to know about "how much he loved Gay Paree in the 1950s," they have little interest in hearing how he learned to loath artifice—the sad way style overshadows substance or how attitude trumps ability over and over again.

Most biographers do not want to hear about his fondest memories of his times in London and Paris—the 'cottages,' the t-rooms, the public pissoirs, temples conceived and existing solely to bring relief to the male member, not distinguishing between straight or gay, and unconcerned with superficial divisions like color or religion, or how old or young, how pretty or ugly, how rich or poor the cock is. Before there were hook-up sites, or bars, or even bathhouses, men have always gathered together indoors and outdoors, in places like that, to pull out their meat and let nature take its course. He knows that it is only his devotees who are really interested in the distasteful truth.

REX prefers that his life story began after he fled the crushing confinement of luxury and fortune and rediscovered his independence once again on the streets of New York during the early 1960s. When people want to know about his inspirations and how he got his big break in publishing, he tells a far grittier tale.

In a magazine shop on 8th Street between Greenwich Village and St. Mark's Place, just beyond the curtain that separated the unread copies of LIFE, Popular Mechanics, and Ladies Home Journal from the shop's actual trade, REX discovered his true calling. In the rows and rows of shelves containing black and white photo magazines, pulp novels with scurrilous titles, and collections of bound drawings, he first encountered Tom of Finland, not the man, but a pirated collection of his 'dirty little drawings,' and like so many men of his generation, his life was irrevocably changed by what he saw.

For the generations that have grown up with gay characters on television and in the movies, who can find 'man on man'

magazines in street corner kiosks and national bookstore chains, or more hardcore action available in both local video shops and online on demand, it is difficult to remember that in the USA in the 1960s both homosexuality and pornography were illegal. Though many in the LGBT community want to give credit to the birth of America's gay consciousness to the drag queens and rebels at the Stonewall Tavern, New York City's criminal underworld had long known that the number of men who loved men was far greater than the general population recognized, and gladly provided this invisible subculture with images and activities deemed dangerous and 'socially corrosive' by vice squads, state courts and the population at large.

Where inquisitive academics of the time with a broad liberal arts backgrounds could find gay role models hidden in history, from Aristotle to Alexander, William of Orange to Walt Whitman or Oscar Wilde, the average man on the street was offered only examples of the suicidal or the psychotic homosexual in the popular press and movie media, lumping all gay men together with Leopold and Loeb, child dressers. Tom of Finland's images of strong, healthy, happy men hav ing sex with men, passionately and enthusiastically, without remorse or regret, was an earth-shaking discovery for many men, including REX.

As a sexually active youth who had been "kept" for more than three years, who had tricks in three countries and two languages, REX was by no means naive in the ways of the world, yet these unapologetic images spoke to him in a way no lover or anonymous stranger ever had. Never in his brief stint at the Art academy or the endless walking tours through museums of Europe had he been as physically or emotionally moved as he was by the small, poorly printed portfolio of pencil drawings most likely reproduced without the artist's knowledge or consent. Tom's shameless bravery and graphic honesty inspired REX in a way that his first love, Caravaggio, never had.

Six months later, he returned to the shop where he'd first encountered Tom's work, and cautiously and carefully showed his own early erotic artistic experiments to the shop's clerk, sitting behind the counter, and much to his pleasure and surprise, received a wolf whistle and, after a quick phone call, the address of a man he should talk to about publishing his own first edition.

Every fiber in REX's young body told him to keep walking when he saw the four gentlemen on the concrete stairs in front of the old Brooklyn brownstone. He had been around long enough to know that these were not the type of men you say "hello" to without a previous introduction. Nonetheless, he swallowed his reason, walked up to the smartly dressed Italian quarter and half whispered, half mumbled, that he was "there to see Nick," before quickly offering the name of the guy from the magazine shop who had sent him.

Instead of the bullying he anticipated, one of the four looked him up and down, gave him the slightest smile, and offered to show him the way. Walking up the darkened interior staircase, the only sound the boy who would be REX recalls was the pounding in his chest and his ears, and the overwhelming sense that he would never come back down those stairs again, and in many ways, he never did.

Entering an unnumbered door without knocking, he passed through the front room unnoticed by the seven old men and women, dressed almost entirely in black, who yelled and argued with each other in Italian as a radio played. They did knock when they reached the door in the back, and after a startlingly loud "Gimme a Minute!", a young woman with messed up hair opened the door, buttoning her blouse and exiting so they could enter.

Although it had looked like an apartment building from the outside, REX was as surprised to see the vast warehouse of boxes, as he was to see the man behind the desk, smoking the butt of a thick cigar in a stained tank top undershirt. After his escort offered only the briefest of introductions, "Dirty Nick" told our young hero, "Come're Kid, show me what you got."

Instead of unzipping his pants, as he thought the man sitting in his striped boxer shorts expected, the as yet unnamed REX offered up his portfolio instead. And for the second time in his very short pornographic career, REX heard a wolf whistle, followed by the words "My God, boy, we're gonna make you the next Tom of Finland."

He knew down to his very core that there was only one Tom of Finland, and he was only following the master's lead. Nonetheless, the smell of sweat, cigar and dried semen overwhelmed the youngster's senses. "Dirty Nick" would be REX's employer and mentor for the next ten years of his life.

"First thing we gotta do is come up with a name for you. Bob of Brooklyn? Nigel of New York?" Looking at the obscene cover of an 8mm film on the gangster's cluttered desktop, the boy offered its title as a suggestion, and from that day on, one of the most brilliant pointillists of the 20th century has been known to the world solely as "REX."

The New York City of the 21st century bears little, if any resemblance to REX's New York of the 1960s and 70s. The criminal underworld that brought millions to Time Square and 42nd Street has been replaced by the criminal overlords who bring billions to Wall Street before quickly shipping it off to Switzerland and the Cayman Islands. The once notorious "Meatpacking District" is now the home of Manhattan's premier fashion designers and high-end supper-clubs and gastro-pubs.

Although REX had learned many lessons in brutality, honor and the importance of never naming names in his time as courier, shop clerk, and boxing club manager for the Mafia, the experiences that formed the foundation of his artwork and his understanding of true brotherhood began in October 1970, when he first entered the blue-collar biker bar on 11th Avenue called THE EAGLE. To call this place a 'leather bar' would evoke certain contemporary notions and presuppositions that did not exist at that time. The men there dressed like motorcyclists because they actually rode motorcycles, and a black leather jacket was earned, not pulled off the rack at some highend fetish fashion boutique.

The men of the original EAGLE shared two common elements that appear and repeat themselves over and over again throughout REX's life work. Here he encountered the unaffected men he had first met in the public toilets of Paris and London—World War II, Korean War, and Vietnam Veterans, mixed together with dock workers, merchant marines, journey men, burnt-out athletes, defrocked priests and the would-be Satanists that the horny holy men often unintentionally created. In retrospect, we could easily say that they were there because they were all "gay", that this was the secret language they shared, but that would be incorrect—this was NOT a disco, or a drag bar, or a beatnik poetry club.

The men of THE EAGLE'S NEST came to their sexual awareness in the world of men, not through intellectual or socio-political discourse, but through camaraderie and ritual, in institutions separated from the social, economic or moral constraints of the "feminine." Though many of the men in the bar at the time were married to women—that was a separate world, a societal obligation, not a personal choice that many enjoy today. The blue collar biker bar and the motorcycle clubhouses were places where men could be men—unapologetically—where a dude could enjoy a blowjob without having to give anyone $20 or a wedding ring. This was a world where no one was offended by a burp, or a fart, or a grappling on a pool table. Before the era of the fashion-forward pageant crowd, these places where for men who worked with their hands, who fought and fucked without fear of retribution or arrest, and who were never embarrassed by the dirt under their fingernails.

Like the under-groomed, uninhibited, all-natural workingman, dirt is the second key component in REX's world. In their company, the artist learned the importance "dirt" plays in masculine sexual imagery. He firmly believes that as a masculine "prop", dirt and grease can do for a man what makeup does for a woman. The unwashed look of the men in his drawings resulted directly from coming to terms with the role dirt of many types plays in underpinning a man's sex appeal; either with or without it. His devotees frequently tell him..."hmm, I can smell your men."

Because he had a talent they wanted, REX achieved a certain acceptance in the periphery of the world of organized crime with relative ease, yet the crowd at THE EAGLE was not as immediately welcoming. He did not own a motorcycle, he was not a veteran, and though he had seen more blood and bullet holes than the average enlisted man, the most significant condition of his day-job was his respect for and adherence to "the code of silence." So initially, he watched the ritual and raw ravagings from the sidelines, studying the men and the artistry with which they embraced and broke the laws of nature. In this brave new world, these leather clad industrial studs practiced and perfected acts only alluded to, and often inadequately referenced, in the pocket book porno-stories that he had recently begun to illustrate.

Only after a short-order cook that he had been stalking saw him working on a sketch and recognized his style from the pages of the ROUGH TRADE series, one of the first hard-core series of illustrated sex novels, was he asked to make a portrait, and then help with the covers for one of the biker club's mimeographed newsletters. Soon after, he earned his leather jacket and found himself invited on road rallies and to initiation parties, where he began to transition from the role of observer to that of full-fledged participant in bizarre yet fully consensual acts, most often described in psychological manuals, exploitative pulp fiction and police reports of the time.

When he began working as the House Artist for New York's notorious MINESHAFT in 1976, his technique took a dramatic turn, moving from the realm of imaginative illustration into the world of unquestionable art. Like many soldiers who return from the battlefield with a distinct and undeniable hatred for firearms, REX's time with the Mafia showed him first-hand the clear differ ence between sex and violence, and though both play significant roles in male fantasy in the Western world, REX's work became focused on hard and aggressive play, not the over-romanticizing of force, violence or victimization. His time spent at THE EAGLE helped him understand that true male sexuality is not a byproduct of reason or "political correctness"—many men enjoy the most filthy and depraved avenues of sex for psychological or subconscious reasons unique to each individual. And in fact, sometimes the more unacceptable or forbidden the act in the eyes of moralists, the most tantalizing and titillating it becomes.

Intentionally located in the Meatpacking district below 14th Street in Green wich Village, in hopes of encouraging 'limp-wristed' tourist and spoiled Uptown elitists who "wouldn't be caught dead in a place like that," the building vanished in light of day. Its proximity to the Hudson River tunnels and bridges provided easy access for redneck bikers and average working Joes who frequently snuck in from New Jersey for deviant fun away from the wife and kids. Amid ancient derelict slaughterhouses and packing plants, along the dirty streets and stinking doorways, deserted by sundown, an unmarked fire-engine red metal door on Washington Street, lead to the entrance of THE MINESHAFT. Visitors were greeted outside by a biker in full leather who checked membership cards or IDs. THE MINESHAFT limited its dress code to leather and Levis, and no one in suits, sneakers or casual wear was allowed in. The most contentious rule being that no artificial "scents" such as deodorants or perfumes were allowed on any man who entered. The slightest whiff of anything pretty or vaginal meant instant rejection. Many men were turned away nightly, but those that got in constituted the hottest group of men gathered together in one place that REX had ever seen, before or since. The place was marked by its smell and dress code, but as the era of political correctness kicked in, these rules became the subject of heated debate.

The bar's owner, a 'hard ass' named Wally, had come to the big city to study theater and work on Broadway, but soon found his calling far from the Great White Way, in the gritty underworld of sexual theatrics. What on the surface looked like an abandoned warehouse was in fact carefully orchestrated sleaze, mapped out by the owner down to the slightest detail. The place became famous for its low sinister lighting—unique at that time, but much emulated since—inviting sex at every turn. Wally brought in theatrical experts to design the lighting scheme that prevailed throughout the two story building, creating pockets of illumination, intended specifically to enhance every sexual "scene," from pin-lights over slings to nearly pitch black spots in the glory hole booths, set with a single spot focused solely on the point of revelation.

It was at THE MINESHAFT that REX first became aware of how important "lighting" is to both great sex and in portraying sex in a two dimensional medium. Before he started "living" at THE MINESHAFT, the lighting in his drawings can seem flat with his focus on the action itself. The more he studied nightly the effect lighting had in contributing to the sexual magic of the place, the more attention he began to pay to the lighting in his own drawings. His focus shifted from black dots on white paper to bright figures emerging from shadow and darkness.

By that time REX had published two portfolios of his own, MANOEUVERS and ICONS, and was quickly becoming known as one of the hot young gay artists in New York. Gay celebrities from all over the world visited THE MINESHAFT, politicians and political scumbags, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award recipients, Tony and Academy Award winners, along with a well-known billionaire investment tycoon with a magazine named for himself, fucked with and beside longshoremen, dock workers, plumbers and electricians. Porn stars, rock stars, and world-class escorts met with some famous "Factory" artist, and his physique model, turned escort, turned junkie avant-garde film star/traveling companion.

Before it closed in November 1985—another victim of AIDS and the hysteria and chaos that surrounded the epidemic in the United States—REX finished three posters for the club, which in turn were reproduced on thousands of T-shirts and tank tops which tourists purchased as souvenirs of their pilgrimage to THE MINESHAFT, spreading his images worldwide for the first time in his adult life.

For REX, the Great Folsom Fire of 1981 foreshadowed the death of gay men's culture in America. Every original piece of REX's artwork that was not in the hands of private collectors or publishers burned over the course of ten hours along with three city blocks in the heart of San Francisco's South of Market.

In the decade that followed, REX watched as the plague spread like the flames that devoured his drawings, taking away his friends, lovers, tricks and admirers—strong, vibrant rebels removed from the world, one by one, like some sinister plot, while most American politicians said nothing, and so many religious leaders in the United States gloated over the suffering of undesirables.

The USA of the 1990s, the editorial staff of DRUMMER Magazine adopted the same restrictive guidelines as the rest of America's mainstream soft-core mass market publications of the time, imposing aesthetic rather than informed biological understanding and responsibility—no ejaculation, no urination, no perspiration, no smoking, and no touching, and as any fan of REX's knows, these are but a few of his favorite things. He was told instead, that his artwork might be considered if he focused his illustrative genius on smooth, CLEAN, single-figure drawings of wholesome youths between the ages of 18 and 32, preferably wearing the latest male leather lingerie. Where many consistently employed erotic artists of his time were financially forced to "tone it down," REX simply said "Fuck You" and retired.

When the opportunity to move to Europe once again presented itself in the late winter of 2010, he immediately leapt at the chance to preserve both his legacy and his sanity. Relocating to Amsterdam early in the spring of 2011, the old master feels like he is home once again. After twenty long years, sales and commissions were ten times as great as anything offered before his self-imposed exile.

Artists, interviewers, and fans, both old and new, still regularly ask, "When can I meet REX?" And the answer is quite simple. If you have ever knelt down in front of a glory hole and found yourself truly amazed and physically inspired by what came poking through that hole, then there is a very good chance that you have already met him.