Peter Reed from a 1977 photo shoot for After Dark magazine. The Flickr page this is from also has photos of the dancer by Robert Mapplethorpe (no longer…see below), while the After Dark pools have a wealth of scanned material ranging from the sexy to the iniquitous, with hair and fashion crimes aplenty.
David Meyer in Salomé.
And if you make your way past the shirtless models and naked ballet boys, the 1975 pages have a nice set of pictures from Lindsay Kemp’s Salomé which I hadn’t seen before.
Update: Unfortunately Hilly Blue has had to delete all his Flickr pages but he’s now blogging here. He explains what happened in the comments below.
Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Salomé archive
Previously on { feuilleton }
• Felix D’Eon
• Dancers by John Andresen
• Youssef Nabil
• Images of Nijinsky
• The art of Hubert Stowitts, 1892–1953
I remember seeing some old After Dark magazines years ago, and was struck by the mixture of arts coverage and what amounted to softcore pron for gay men. Lots of dancer boy bulges under the guise of art. The Flickr sets you linked to are fab, lots of homoerotic vintage deliciousness! Thanks for the link.
Yeah, I’ve been going through those pages all day, there’s some really hot stuff there! Lots of obscure stuff as well, like the Lindsay Kemp pics.
I hadn’t come across After Dark before, I’m sure copies must have made their way over here but I don’t recall seeing any. It does what Films and Filming used to do with cinema, F&F being a film review mag that filled its pages with titillating stills (always b&w) of nude actors. AD is better though–more gay, more variety and better pictures.
And I love the fact that it was kind of shameless too. I mean “we’re a SERIOUS arts magazine *wink* *wink*, so here are a heap of pretty boys in their underwear!”
I’m a huge fan of vintage homoerotica, so this is like an Aladdin’s cave… :)
“After Dark” was a fabulous magazine! I forgot all about it!
That top picture is outrageously delicious.
I did a post last week on Lindsay Kemp; I always thought he was in Spandau Ballet!
(heh heh.)
Ooh, an interesting thing about the terrific link: “Hilly Blue” was the name of the MALE character played by Divine in the fabulous Alan Rudolph film “Trouble in Mind”. The movie also includes a gorgeous butt-shot of a young and studly Keith Carradine. Just thought I’d mention it.
AND FURTHERMORE: Speaking of “Salome”—which I see is a recurring item here—have you ever seen Ken Russell’s “Salome’s Last Dance”? It is BEYOND FABULOUS! One of my all-time very favorite things ever.
Spandau Ballet…ugh! Mr Kemp may have worn some outrageous outfits over the years (not least the huge penis he sports in Sebastiane) but I bet he never stooped to wearing tablecloths!
Well spotted about Hilly Blue, I love Trouble in Mind but forgot Divine’s name in that. A great, weird little film, I need to watch it again. I love the way Keith Carradine’s hair gets larger and more extravagant as he becomes increasingly power-crazed.
I avoided Russell’s Salome when it appeared having lost my patience with him by that point. I rated his earlier films a great deal but Lair of the White Worm made me snap… My loss, I know. I should give it another chance.
Oh, “Salome’s Last Dance” more than makes up for “Lair of the White Worm”, which was utter silliness! “Salome” has it’s silliness too, but it’s balanced by great acting and terrific sets. And GLENDA JACKSON! There are moments of true beauty in it. Very theatrical (not unlike Jarman or films like “Lilies”).
Still hasn’t come out on dvd in the US, so I’m clinging to my vhs tape!
I was a close friend of the Editor in Chief and creator of After Dark, Bill Como. He had an amazing ability to recognise talent and included stars to be like Meryl Streep on the front cover of the magazine long before they made it.
He was also Editor in Chief of dance magazine and a doyen of NYC society. Most importantly he love the entertainment business and arts.
Its great that some of you are rediscovering the wonderful magazine AD was and the superb photography of Ken Duncan, Jack Mitchell and the like which hasn’t neen matched since.
Thanks for putting the update information about my blog. I wanted to let you know that the decision to delete the pages and images from Flickr were not mine. Flickr has a stict policy that only images taken by you are allowed to be posted. They don’t necessarily follow that rule until someone complains. The only complaint I had received was from Peter Berlin’s manager who felt the images I posted from After Dark were hindering their ability to sell pictures of Peter if people could see them for free on Flickr.
Again…thanks for the update and I’m glad you found my blog. Look for more After Dark (possibly minus the images of Peter)
Hello there. I thought that might be the reason the pages had vanished after you’d gone to the trouble of uploading so much. A shame because I’d recommended them to friends on several occasions.
This page is currently one of the most popular ones here on account of Peter Reed’s tight buns appearing on the new Scissor Sisters album.
Yeah, it was very depressing when one morning I checked my Flickr and it was there and then that afternoon I went back and it was gone. My heart sank to my stomach.
At least with Blogger, if someone has a rights issue, they will notify you first and allow you to take down the one image and not delete your whole account without warning.
I love Scissor Sisters and when the cover of their new album was revealed, I was like….I know that photo!!!!
Thanks again!
So the picture here is not by Robert Mapplethorpe and the other ones that used to be on Flickr are? I really have got to be enlightened here!
Hi Luke. That’s correct, the photo at the top of this page was from After Dark magazine and I’ve not seen a credit for the photographer. Peter Reed was also photographed by Robert Mapplethorpe and if you search around a little it shouldn’t be too difficult to find a set of the pictures. One of them, showing PR’s bum, was used on the cover of the recent Scissor Sisters album.