This, the 7th Housedeer, presented in book form, contains a lengthy interview with poets and artists Steve Dalachinsky and Yuko Otomo in New York. It’s a wonderful, timeless conversation with an introduction by Yuko. Everyone who knew Steve will no doubt be able to hear his voice coming off the pages. For anyone who did not know him, his voice comes through just as clearly and just as Steve.
The poems in The Language of Weather by the Australian-Sinto Gypsy poet Lee Fuhler were written between 1995 and 2024, and this is his first book published in the United States. Lee grew up in Melbourne, where sometime around the start of the new century he met and befriended the artist Vali Myers, who had been given a copy of his book, Dogstown. She became a great supporter of his work, publishing one of his collections herself, and lines of his poetry decorate some of her later diaries, which are held in the collection of the State Library Victoria and can be accessed online.
Housedeer Issue No. Six features an interview with Mumtaz Manji, who tells the extraordinary story of her life, beginning in an entirely different part of the world from where she would find herself later. Born in Tanzania, Mumtaz lived in Kenya, Belgian Congo and Uganda in her early years, and in 1972 she was one of the many people expelled from Uganda by the murderous Idi Amin, an event that made news around the world. Thanks to this accident of violent political upheaval, Mumtaz ended up in Canada as a refugee with three small children, no English and, as she puts it, “a big jackass for a husband” who would eventually become her “ex.”
Issue Number Five features the legendary Agosto Machado, one of the last remaining performers from a truly golden age of theatre in New York. He learned his craft by doing it. He worked with Jack Smith and Mario Montez, with John Vaccaro and his Playhouse of the Ridiculous, with Jackie Curtis and Ellen Stewart at La MaMa, with Hibiscus and the Cockettes in San Francisco and New York, and with many others besides. And he continues his work in the present.
Everett Quinton became famous during his years with The Ridiculous Theatrical Company and he’s never stopped acting. He lives in Greenwich Village with his pretty dog, Raindrop, who he dotes on. Any performance of any kind with Everett in it is worth seeing. There’s just nobody like him.
This is the cover of Housedeer Issue No. 3, devoted to the painter Louise Oliver through interviews done with her son and daughter, Edgar and Helen. The cover image is a drawing made for this issue by Regina Bartkoff, called Edgar, Louise and Helen. Last autumn, Edgar Oliver staged a one-man show at Theater 80 on St. Marks Place in New York called Helen & Edgar. In it, he told many stories about Louise Oliver and the childhood years he and Helen spent with her in Savannah. The show earned a stellar review from Ben Brantley of the New York Times.
This issue of Housedeer makes a wonderful compliment to that show for anyone who got to see it, but it also stands alone as a tribute to a truly exceptional woman who lived for her art and for her children.
Issue No. 2 is devoted to the much loved and admired performer, writer and absolute original Justin Vivian Bond. As a transperson, Justin prefers the pronoun v and the honorific Mx to the standard gender-specific ones, and this cover image, Elegant Transdeer, was created specifically for v by Michele Burgevin. In 2012 Justin unveiled a fragrance called The Afternoon of a Faun, inspired by a poem by Stéphane Mallarmé called L’après-midi d’un faune.
The first issue of Housedeer is devoted to the artist Liza Stelle Condon. She was the daughter of Jazz great Eddie Condon and copywriter Phyllis Condon. Her sister Maggie offers wonderful stories of their childhood years here in New York on Washington Square Park, when Eddie Condon’s club was the Studio 54 of the day. The cover image, used with permission, was taken on Bleecker Street in New York City in 1947 by Berenice Abbott, who was a good friend of Liza’s.