Picture
Picture
a rose is a rose is a rose
Gertrude Stein

Ms. Stein was an eccentric, butch- lesbian writer, poet, bohemian,
cutting edge French art collector at the turn of the century.
Her life is celebrated at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in SF
with an extensive collection of photographs, art work, books, clothes, and
plays written by Stein.  Also part of the collection are some of
Gertude's  vests and family shots of her and her life time
partner, Alice B. Toklas. I laughed out loud at the photo of her and Alice
with flowery hats standing in Piazza San Marco in Venice.  The piazza is a  centuries old tourist attraction that I visited in the 1970's.
The funny part of this is that there are so many pigeons and birds in this piazza that I thought a bird may land on Gertie's colorful hat of flowers!  I am so glad that these women  were having a good time touring around Italy and France.

 Gertrude was a native San Franciscan and lived in France and had art salons
 at her house where she befriended some of the greatest painters of her time.
 Her and her brothers began to collect their art. This very large collection of some of the masters of art is concurrently showing at the SF MOMA .
 The curators of both museums planned it that way.  What a good idea!

Ms. Stein  was also a "model" of sorts, minus the  stereotypical "feminine
beauty" of the Victorian era. She was also intent on  self promotion, getting herself very well known.  She posed for many of the great artists
of her day including Picasso, Matisse, and Man Ray. They too enjoyed her
as a lively subject for their art.
I found her facial expressions while posing for these portrait sittings,
strongly masculine often redundantly stoic throughout the
pictures exhibited.  She liked to think of herself as having the features of a Roman Emperor on a Italian coin with her large nose. She was a short obese woman with shortly cropped hair, a style that women didn't wear in her era! Although she liked to think of herself as cool in her male garb, I found her outfits unflattering and dowdy, not at all the suave dandy she may have felt like sometimes.  Who knows really what went inside of this woman's mind.  One would think that with all of her famous male artist friends in Paris that she would have utilized their fashion sense better!   Oy vey!

Besides  her  interesting  portrayal  of herself, this woman had CHUTZPAH!
She was bold and that is BEAUTIFUL and HANDSOME!
There were a few of the portraits of her relaxing with Alice that I felt really captured her "essence". I felt the love between these two great lesbian
pioneers! 

I enjoyed the exhibit very much because it was more than a glimpse
of this powerful woman's life and times. Later on she became a very famous lesbian heroine and lesbian herstory wouldn't be the same without Ms. Stein. She was way ahead of her time and had the vision to be open to groups and cultures that were not accepted like Afrfican Americans.
She casted an all-black ensemble for one of her plays.  That was so brave to do this in her  time.  So Gertie Stein, you were really the first famous lesbian who lived with a great deal of style and panache....Maybe Sappho came first
tho, right?

Oddly, there was a episode of blatant discrimination and homophobia that happened at this exhibit a few weeks ago.  A security guard told two lesbian women to STOP HOLDING HANDS at the EXHIBIT!  This caused
a community outrage in a very GAY & TOLERANT San Francisco, the LGBT mecca of the world! 
The women complained to the Museum Director, the guard got immediately reprimanded and his contract terminated and a letter of apology was sent
out by the museum that says it has an inclusive policy of acceptance of ALL people! 
Of course, the following week, a KISS -IN was staged in protest of this act of discrimination at the museum. Nothing like a little bit of love spread around
to dissolve fear and hatred! 

It seemed ironic that lesbians would be harassed at the Jewish museum
that was celebrating the life of a famous Jewish LESBIAN!
Go figure!  Anyway, kudos to the CJM for promoting their culture and a powerful lesbian and handling the intolerant  homophobe guard.
The address and website for the Contemproary Jewish Museum is:
 736 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA (415) 655-7800  ‎ www. thecjm.org  

 
 


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