The Revolution Is My Boyfriend published by Baron, the latest book by queercore icon Bruce LaBruce, is an unapologetic visual anthology of homoeroticism and non-conformist counterculture.

Bruce LaBruce (1964, Canada) was one of the founders of the homocore movement, which was characterized by an extreme or guerrilla-type punk/homosexual artistic expression. The Revolution Is My Boyfriend is a visual retrospective of LaBruce’s career to date and includes both film and artist works.

The book features porn actors, trans people, punks, skinheads, and skaters and celebrates the beauty of the marginalised, the misfit, the outcasts of society. Stills from pivotal films like No Skin Off My Ass (1993), Super 8-½ (1994) and Gerontophilia (2013) are featured, as well as photography from his personal life. The Revolution Is My Boyfriend, depicts a life-spanning career and grasps the subversive essence of the life and work of Bruce LaBruce: abrasive and unabashed.

LaBruce’s work is a representation of queer culture that is revolutionary, punk and underground. Even though time and context are subject to change, LaBruce stays true to his rebellious spirit. ‘’When I started making movies in the early ‘90s there weren’t a lot of filmmakers making sexually-explicit films, and certainly not as blatantly pornographic as mine. More recently it’s become more commonplace, but the thing is I keep pushing the boundaries and pushing myself to go further and further, so I still manage to be provocative and scandalous. It’s a hard job but somebody has to do it.’’, Bruce explains.

For LaBruce, homosexuality is something that goes against society. The Revolution Is My Boyfriend centres on anti-establishment queer rebellion, as opposed to rainbow capitalism and pink-washing. ‘’The mainstreaming of gay culture has been disastrous for homosexual identity and artistic expression by gays. Homosexuality has always been based either on opposition to, and rebellion against, the mainstream, or on exerting itself as an invisible influence on art, fashion, and culture. The assimilationist movement has diminished gay expression. It has eliminated its most extreme (and interesting) elements, in order to make it more acceptable to the masses, and it has commodified itself as just another lifestyle choice, or a target market to be exploited by capitalist entities..’’, says Bruce.

The personal is political for Bruce LaBruce. His societal critique is interwoven in all his work. As Guy Debord puts it, everything that was directly lived has moved away into a representation. Blurring the lines between life and work, LaBruce simultaneously stretches the definitions of art and pornography. About this entanglement, LaBruce says: ‘’I started as an experimental filmmaker, so it was very much just about documenting my life and my friends. It was casual, somebody filming me getting my nipple pierced, or somebody shoplifting… Whatever, doing something crazy. And then I started to use porn as a kind of political statement, because I was in the punk scene and it was homophobic at the time. So I made very “in your face” experimental movies to show in punk clubs and alternative art spaces that were very frank and open and unapologetic about homosexuality and sex. I would get punched in the nose by homophobic punks or skinheads.’’

Now, we live in a day and age where queer culture is gaining more acceptance and is simultaneously under attack. However, La Bruce isn’t worried about the future of queercore: ‘’Queercore is now a cult, and cults can pretty much go on forever.’’

Bruce LaBruce

Bruce LaBruce (1964) is a Canadian artist, filmmaker, director, photographer, actor, writer and editor based in Toronto. Among his features are the classic No Skin Off My Ass (1993) and Hustler White (1996), and the more recent Gerontophilia (2013) and Saint-Narcisse (2020) and the short porn film collection It’s not the Pornographer Who Is Perverse (2018). Lately he has been directing pornographic films, such as Scotch Egg(2018) and The Affairs Of Lidia (2022), for feminist porn icon Erika Lust. LaBruce is widely celebrated as a cult director and has received critical acclaim. In 2015, LaBruce’s film work was shown in a large retrospective at the MoMA New York and, in 2023, he received the “Filmmaker on the Edge” award for that year at the Provincetown Film Festival from John Waters.

Hardback 

250 pages

27 x 32 cm