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By Root 489 0

more than his art, was his penchant for commercialization. He exploited many merchandising opportunities during his lifetime, and encouraged the younger artist Keith Haring to do the same. Haring’s strange graffiti-inspired drawings of men, angels, babies, hearts, and dogs have become ubiquitous through greeting cards, tote bags, shower curtains, and even sheets. In 1986, four years before his death, Haring opened Pop Shop in Manhattan’s SoHo, selling household items and stationery featuring his art. The art world was in an uproar about how this young, edgy artist had sold out. Yet Haring’s move paved the way for many other artists and designers, helping to blur the line between the serious art world and pop-culture consumerism.

In 2001 both he and Andy Warhol were named in a list of the “richest deceased celebrities” in Forbes magazine. Haring’s estate earned $4 million in 2001 alone. (Haring died of AIDS in 1990.) In the same year, Andy Warhol’s estate made more than $8 million licensing his art. (Warhol died in 1987 during a gallbladder operation.)

Gay men and the gay sensibility created pop culture, and now homosexual designers continue to make their mark on what Americans want to buy. Thousands of straight high-school- and college-age kids furnish their bedrooms and dorm rooms with gay designer Todd Oldham’s hip striped bedroom collection for the mass-market chain Target. Oldham, who once designed couture shirts and hip hotels, took his inspiration from the disco seventies when he first began designing for Target in 2003.

“True to form, Oldham has created products with pattern and personality to spare,” wrote Marge Colborn, the Detroit News design editor. “He’s reinterpreted camouflage, played with multicolor stripes, put a fancy spin on stars and brought vintage varsity letters into the 21st century.”

On a blunter note, Matt, a gay blogger who works for the New School University in New York City, posted this note when the collection debuted: “Leave it to Oldham to take a classic gay fantasy, the dorm room, and make it perfectly palpable [sic] for mass American tastes. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw all the crap Target was peddling under the Todd Oldham label. Most of it is simply repurposed plastic hangers and plates in neon colors. But now that I’ve seen it in over half the rooms of my dorm, I have to admit it’s pretty stylish.”

Target has also recruited the wonderfully swishy Isaac Mizrahi to bring style to its women’s-wear collection. Mizrahi, a former couture designer, was the star of a witty, funny documentary, Unzipped, filmed by his then-boyfriend, Douglas Keeve. The film follows him throughout his nutty quest to base his 1994 collection of dresses and coats on the silent movie Nanook of the North. Now that’s gay.

After his design firm failed, Mizrahi started moving closer to the mass market, landing his own talk show on the Oxygen network. But he made the final leap into America’s homes and closets by signing up with Target. In 2003 he announced the debut of the Isaac Mizrahi for Target line of women’s clothing and accessories. “My clothes have always celebrated the style of American women of all ages and all walks of life,” said Mizahi in his announcement. “Now, through my partnership with Target, I can offer my designs to more women than ever before at accessible prices.”

In 2004, Target began airing a campy commercial with Mizrahi as a lounge singer, crooning the old Frank Sinatra standard “I Believe in You” to the many women clustered around his piano. Could there be a more perfect metaphor for how gay designers have become safe for straight America?

Chapter 6

Butts and Cocks: Gay Men and the Future of Sex

I just don’t want to be known as the “up-the-butt” girl.

—Kristin Davis, playing Charlotte on Sex and the City

It pisses straight people off when I mention this, but the simple fact that I’m gay—the blessing of my homosexuality—was all the preparation I needed to give sex advice. Gay people know more about sex than straight people do, have more sex than straight people