World Famous Comics: Queer Latino Testimonio, Keith Haring, and Juanito Xtravaganza: Hard Tails (New Directions in Latino American Culture)
Queer Latino Testimonio, Keith Haring, and Juanito Xtravaganza: Hard Tails (New Directions in Latino American Culture)
By: Arnaldo Cruz-Malave Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Average Rating: Binding: Paperback Label: Palgrave Macmillan Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 248 Publication Date: October 02, 2007 Release Date: October 02, 2007
In the tradition of the Latin American testimonio, thisis the story of Juan Rivera, a.k.a. Juanito Xtravaganza, a Latino runaway youth who ends up homeless in the streets of New York in the late 70s and becomes partner of the internationally famous 1980s Pop artist Keith Haring during some of the most frenetically productive years of his brief life, as told to the author and retold by him. A hybrid text--part testimonio, part linguistic and cultural analysis, and part art criticism--this is also a history of New York Latino neighborhoods during this period of devastating disinvestment and gentrification, as well as a personal, heart-felt meditation on the art of listening and the ethical limits of representing queer Latino lives.
A New Classic in Latino Queer Studies This book is an absolute must-read for people interested in queer Latino experience and culture. Cruz-Malavé does an outstanding job of conveying the life story of Juanito Extravaganza (Juan Rivera), a Puerto Rican gay man from New Haven, Connecticut, who traveled the world as Keith Haring's boyfriend in the 1980s. Cruz-Malavé also offers nuanced meditations on the Latin American practice of testimonio, on Keith Haring's gay New York, and on Latino gay shame. Make sure to catch the dramatized readings of this book that Cruz-Malavé occasionally offers with the Puerto Rican actor Jorge Merced (from Pregones Theater in the Bronx).