Corliss Cavalieri is a Philadelphia based artist, having studied at the Maryland Institute College of Art (Baltimore, MD) and Tyler School of Art (Philadelphia, PA), earning a BFA and MFA degrees respectively from those institutions. He has exhibited within the tri-state area of New York, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. In Philadelphia he has exhibited at Pageant: Soloveev Gallery, Burrison Art Gallery, William Way Center, and was a member of the co-operative space Zone One, where he exhibited as well as curated exhibitions. Mr. Cavalieri has shown his work at the Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art; he was a member of 55 Mercer Street Gallery in New York, for twelve years, and he was selected as an exhibiting artist in Philadelphia's Flesher Art Memorial’s 40th "Wind Challenge" Exhibition program of 2017-18. Mr. Cavalieri has attended various residencies: Vermont Studio Center (VT) in 1996, 2006, and 2007; Yaddo (NY) in 2009; Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VA) in 2010; the Can Serrat Residency in Spain in 2012; Jentel Residency (WY) in 2015; the Auvillar Residency in France, 2016, and as a McDowell Fellow for 2020 (NH) where he was chosen as the Robert and Stephanie Olmstead Fellow. He has work in public and private collections. He maintains an active studio practice where he paints full-time in Philadelphia.

I had a hell of a lot of fun throughout my early life within the club atmosphere of the "Gay World" with dancing, music, night life, and sexy men: it was a veritable modern day Franz Hals painting with Tom of Finland characters for the 70's and early 80's. But with the onslaught of HIV, a great deal of sadness came along. We all have our influences and directions, mine remains my experiences in the gay world ranging from subtle influence or more obvious impact. I paint about the human condition; but, I seek a wider truth.

David Acosta is a poet, writer, curator, and cultural worker. A long time LGBTQ and AIDS activist since the 1980’s. He was appointed as a member of the First Commission on Sexual Minorities by Mayor Wilson Goode, and also served on the first LGBTQ Police Advisory Committee. He was the founder of the GALAEI Project in 1987 and was the Coordinator of HIV Prevention Programs for the AIDS Activities Coordinating Office of the Philadelphia Department of Public Health. He has been involved with ACT UP Philadelphia, Queer Action, the LGBTQ Center for Law and Public Policy, and Liberty City. He is currently the Artistic Director for Casa De Duende which he co-founded along with his life partner Gerald Macdonald; the President of the Board of the Da Vinci Art Alliance, and a member of the Board of the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance. David is also a member of the international artist collective Dislocada/ Dislocated, and the artist collective Dissident Bodies in Philadelphia.

He is a published author and poet whose work has appeared in many anthologies and literary magazines: The Americas Review (University of Texas Press, 1997), American Poetry Confronts the 1990s (Black Tie Press 1990), The Limits of Silence (Asterion Press 1991), Poesida (Ollantay Press, 1995) and Floating Borderlands: Twenty Five Years of Latin American Poetry in The United States (University of Washington Press, 1998); Mayrena, The James White Review, The Evergreen Chronicles, Philomel, and others. He is a contributing writer to Queer Brown Voices, the first anthology focusing on documenting the history of the LGBTQ+ latinx movement in the United States and Puerto Rico.

For this exhibition I have selected the presentation of four poems of differing lengths dealing with the subject of memory, love, and queer desire. The first two poems titled Threnody and Requiem respectively are from an unedited manuscript of poems titled Songs to Survive the Body. The poems in that collection were all written during the darkest years of the AIDS epidemic, and remain, even today, a difficult manuscript for me to revisit. The other two poems are from a more recent and as of yet untitled manuscript.