From Christopher Harrity’s review for the Advocate:
Berlin, before the rise of the Nazi party in the early part of the last century, was one of the most evolved cities in Europe regarding homosexuality. Germany was both very open to the idea of a gay identity (the word homosexual was coined in Germany in 1869 as an understood identity) and at the same time repressed (Paragraph 175 [1871-1977] was part of the German Criminal Code that equated homosexuality with bestiality and child rape).
While Berlin became the capital of the world for open gay expression and identity, at the same time the Nazi party expanded the scope of Paragraph 175 which resulted in thousands of gay men being prosecuted, imprisoned and put to death.
Pacifico Silano’s first solo exhibit takes its title, Against Nature, from the language of Paragraph 175. It uses the gritty images and color scheme of the Nazi party and of the Prussian national movements. Comprised of found and researched images, his own photography and ephemera, Silano considers the relationship of the individual to the collective as it relates to identity, memory, history, and the Holocaust.
View the exhibition at ClampArt
Browse all of Pacifico Silano’s work at ClampArt