Models and Photographers
“It is important to realize that the outrage over lesbian sex magazines was not focused on the text, but rather on the photography. As much as the pictures incited lust and joy, they provoked hateful letters and outrage. . . . It was the pictures that got us in trouble, over and over again; it was the pictures that made us realize we were cutting the edge right off.”
–Susie Bright[1]
On Our Backs was a magazine of photography—of photographers, photo editors, photo stories, and models—as much as it was a magazine of lesbian feminist sexuality. Within its pages, the two are indivisible. Photographers engaged with developing a lesbian visual culture from the 1970s have spoken often about the potent connections between photographic imagery and identity, community, and visibility, which were crucial for survival and the struggle for equal rights. Photographs were necessary to “fill a perceived void, to fill these blank spaces where desire and questioning and transcendence converged” (Tee Corinne) and for “the construction of a women’s ‘language’ and culture” (Honey Lee Cottrell). JEB framed the stakes succinctly: “Making ourselves visible is a political act.”[2]
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Susie Bright], 1991.
Chromogenic print with overlay
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 104
(1 image)
Bertie Rairez, from “Verdrehn,” 1987.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 69
(1 image)
Barbara Hammer, from “Nitrate Kisses,” 1992.
Gelatin silver print with overlay
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 104
(1 image)
Penny Jerome, Untitled, 1989.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 24 | Folder: 79
(1 image)
Jill Posener, Little girls are special, 1987.
Gelatin Silver Print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 69
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Kokomotion], 1989.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 5 | Folder: gray binder
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Kokomotion and Debi Sundahl], from On Our Backs Lesbian Calendar, 1989.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 5 | Folder: clear binder
(1 image)
But photographs were also troublesome. From photography’s beginnings, types of pictures considered acceptable in other visual media, where the viewer could easily imagine that the subject or scenario is fictitious, have been deemed obscene and subject to censorship as photographs. In the case of On Our Backs, censorship came not only from the straight world but also from the anti-pornography branch of lesbian feminism that dominated at the time. A further dilemma was that photographs could “out” people, at a time when the social and economic repercussions of open queer life could easily be severe. On Our Backs wanted authentic representations of its entire, diverse readership; it wanted pictures of lesbians from all backgrounds, with all tastes, who existed in all social arenas. But in the magazine’s early days, finding people to pose who could take the risk was difficult. Most models were activists or came from the punk scene or sex-work milieu, or were On Our Backs staffers, who posed in a variety of roles and characters.
Honey Lee Cottrell, Cassie and Laurie, from “Cream on Chrome,” 1985.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 6 | Folder: blue binder
(1 image)
Jessica Tanzer, Untitled, 1989.
Gelatin silver print with overlay
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 104
(1 image)
Cookie Hunt, [Aisha], from “Can We Talk?,” 1985.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 69
(1 image)
Leon Mostovoy, [Debi Sundahl], 1989.
Gelatin silver print with overlay
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 104
(1 image)
Phyllis Christopher, [Susie Bright], from “A Day in the Sex Life of On Our Backs,” 1989.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 69
(1 image)
Wolf Levine, from “Tracy and Tanya,” 1987.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 69
(1 image)
As the popularity of the magazine and national queer visibility grew, more courageous women who believed in On Our Backs’ project and wished to portray their own erotic identity came forward to be photographed. This was particularly challenging for women who were “firsts” in the magazine. The writer and bodybuilder Kitty Tsui, On Our Backs’ first Asian-American cover model, spoke of facing pressure to represent an entire cultural community on the one hand, and derision from its more conservative members for posing at all on the other.[3]
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Kitty Tsui competing in Lightweight Physique at the Gay Games, San Francisco], 1987.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 5 | Folder: clear binder
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Self-portrait at a barber shop], n.d.
Gelatin silver print with overlay
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 9 | Folder: 20
(1 image)
Dale Baron, from “Rock and Roll Ramona,” 1985.
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 104
(1 image)
Michael Rosen, [Contact sheet from Honey Lee Cottrell and Susie Bright photo shoot], 1990.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 125
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, from “Shelley as Martin,” 1990.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 5 | Folder: clear binder
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, Morgan and Beth, 1988.
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 5 | Folder: black binder
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, Foxy Francis and the Vixens, 1990.
Gelatin silver prints
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 9 | Folder: 8
(3 images)
Amateur photographers and photographers unknown to the editors submitted images on spec or to contests run by the magazine. Some, like Penny Jerome of Boise, Idaho, lived so far away from any lesbian hub that On Our Backs may have been their only connection to the world it represented.[4] Their images were published alongside those of a remarkable group of staffers and close contributors like Mariette Pathy Allen, Phyllis Christopher, Tee Corinne, Honey Lee Cottrell, Morgan Gwenwald, Leon Mostovoy, Catherine Opie, Jill Posener, and Jessica Tanzer. Preeminent in lesbian circles, few of these photographers have gained acceptance by the mainstream art world and a wider audience for their work.
“Pioneering Erotic Photographers,” On Our Backs, September/October 1989.
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 21A
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, Rachael, 1989.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 5 | Folder: black binder
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, from “The Naughty Gourmet,” 1986.
Gelatin silver prints
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 8 | Folder: 9
(5 images)
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Susie Bright], 1990.
Instant prints with overlay
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 104
(2 images)
Mariette Pathy Allen, [Honey Lee Cottrell and Susie Bright], 1985–88.
Gelatin silver print
Susie Bright papers and On Our Backs records
Collection/Call #: 7788
Box: 13 | Folder: 69
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Loren Rex Cameron], 1990.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 2 | Folder: 17
(1 image)
Honey Lee Cottrell, [Contact sheet from Loren Rex Cameron photo shoot], 1990.
Gelatin silver print
Honey Lee Cottrell papers
Collection/Call #: 7822
Box: 2 | Folder: 17
(1 image)
Footnotes
[1] Bright and Posener, Nothing, 8. ↩
[2] Corinne and Tasmin Wilton, Intimacies (San Francisco: Last Gasp, 2001); Cottrell, “On Looking at Myself Over a Period of Time,” The Blatant Image 1 (1981): 14–16; Joan E. Biren (JEB), “Lesbian Photography: Seeing through Our Own Eyes,” Studies in Visual Communication 9.2 (Spring 1983): 81–96. ↩
[3] Bright, September 2013. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bds79JZnq1M ↩
[4] Ibid. ↩