399 9th Street
San Francisco CA 94103
Yes, Dorothy, there really is a queer tribal underground
We are all potential channelers of an ancient, trans-genderal shamanic tradition
In the early 1990s, Gene Barnes / Portia Manson unveiled Hippie Dick! onto the world. Hippie Dick! was a Xeroxed porn zine that sought to radicalize the tired label “hippie” by mythologizing it within the faerie scene. With literary contributions and occult collages, Hippie Dick! echoed the DIY publishing craze and communal sensibility at Evergreen State College in Olympia, where Barnes was a student. There, he produced various short works of film and video, inspired by his loins, by Kenneth Anger and by his recent HIV positive test results. After graduating, Barnes moved to San Francisco where he built a micro-publishing empire, alternating between print issues of Hippie Dick! and producing made-to-order hardcore hippie porn. Barnes died in 1995, “another boy genius who’s fucking gone,” sang Kathleen Hanna of Gene’s passing on Bikini Kill’s Reject All American LP.
Dirty Looks will reproduce Hippie Dick! volume 1 for the first 100 attendees of the event and Kelly Marie Martin (aka Keroscene), publisher of thorn and executor of Barnes' estate, will give a presentation on the zine and its legacy in advance of the screening.
Mercury Rising, super8 on digital video, 20min., 1990
Like Nothing Else (promo for Herd of Turtles), super8 on digital video, 3:40min., 1990
AIDS 101, video, 23:23min., 1989
Thank Gay I’m God, super8 on digital video, 5:30min., 1989/90
Followed by selections from Hippie Dick! The Movie
and DJ sets by Josh Cheon (Dark Entries), Brontez Purnell + Jill Reiter
and preceded by Pyramid Records' Yang Yang