Nicholas Gamso at the Paris Review:
Only a decade ago, just mentioning the photographer Peter Hujar required explanation. “He took that famous picture of Susan Sontag, recumbent with tired eyes.” Or: “He made gorgeous black-and-white photos of writers, artists, dancers, beautiful men, empty landscapes, and animals.” But today no preamble is necessary. There are countless entry points to Hujar’s extensive oeuvre, many of which appeared in the past year alone: a half-dozen new books; exhibitions in Paris, Berlin, New York, and San Francisco; and most prominently, a biopic, Peter Hujar’s Day, adapted by Ira Sachs from a 1974 interview with Linda Rosenkrantz.
Another avenue opened with the publication of Andrew Durbin’s indispensable The Wonderful World That Almost Was—a joint biography of Hujar and the artist Paul Thek, Hujar’s lover for a time. Released in April, the book details the facts of Hujar’s life, from his miserable childhood to to his ascendance among an illustrious East Village creative circle. Also his 1987 AIDS diagnosis, and his death, later that year, at age fifty-three.
more here.
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