![old gay men cruising in the woods at night old gay men cruising in the woods at night](https://mediaproxy.salon.com/width/1200/height/675/https://media.salon.com/2012/03/rest_stop.jpg)
Trapped in military like repetitions at work where you see the same people day in day out, everything in these hyper regulated spaces accentuates the desire and need for ‘satisfaction’. Using the language of consumerism (bargain basement, reduced, top value, sale, blue X), the film explores men putting themselves on sale, the nasty side of cruising: cheapening/ 'reducing’ yourself/selling yourself cheap. The desire is over - a 'misadventure': maybe the cruise was unreciprocated. The constant blowing and bouncing around of a balloon stands in for imagined (homo)sexual adventure. A playful reflection on everyday temporary and fleeting pornographic encounters and temporary acts of looking, desiring and fantasising that are often hidden/in secret/covert. Look closely and see if you can spot the moving tongue under the surface. The film starts on a train, moves to the office and the world of online cruising, then outside in the bushes, on the street or in fact anywhere two guys can see one another and finishes in a pub in London where I draw upon my own personal experience of being there as a ‘cruiser’ in the early 2000s. Juxtaposing the politics and practices of cruising and spaces of production, this film explores some of the complexities involved in gay cruising in terms of men looking for men but not just going around looking for men in cruising spots like in the woods or public toilets but also looking for men on the internet and telephone chat lines, and in particularly cruising for men whilst at work and on the train to work. For example, moving image recordings made on a Sony Ericsson Cybershoot K800i mobile phone between 2005-2006, mixed media paintings on canvases including office planner sticky dots, mapping pins, supermarket reduced price stickers made between 1999-2005, pencil drawings made in 2019, and recordings made on an iPhone between 2019-2020. It is made using my drawings, paintings and sound and moving image spanning more than 20 years since 1999. This film shows and (self)reflectively critiques different vignettes/scenarios that men cruise i.e., look for men for sex or purely look at men for homoerotic desire. I suggest that by dissecting those optics in relation to homosexuality and desire that this film addresses, we can gain really productive (and at times potentially uncomfortable) insights into the complex nature of the (antagonistic) relations (or as Shannon Phillips refers to above, the ‘dynamics’) cruising produces and constantly reproduces. In other words, I hope the film activates the viewer to consider what may happen in terms of the optics of desire during the moment/encounter when two gay men look at each other. Leading on from what Jonny Symons suggests above, I hope the film activates the viewer to consider what I suggest as being the heavy optical nature associated with the practice of cruising amongst gay men. I know that I still have status in this community.’ taken from Beauty Before Age Growing Older in Gay Culture (1997) by Johnny SymonsĬRUISE (2021) aims to not just highlight to the viewer about different scenarios where and how gay male cruising takes place but encourages the viewer to think about cruising as a ‘relational activity’ that deserves to be fully investigated. ‘Gay men tend to be a very ocular focused society: we look and when we like what we see we look again, we cruise strangers and the way we cruise might not be directly about having sex but we are cruising you to see if you cruise me back and if we are cruising each other then I know that I am desirable.
![old gay men cruising in the woods at night old gay men cruising in the woods at night](https://pyxis.nymag.com/v1/imgs/cc1/041/7130f5b7c7cd878a131a613c4490ec1d5b-25-kevin-riverdale.rsquare.w700.jpg)
OLD GAY MEN CRUISING IN THE WOODS AT NIGHT FULL
lower-class bodies (viewed) with disgust and distrust.’ Shannon Philip (see end for full quote) The commodification of bodies and bodies that are classed as desirable…. Desire is operating from a very neoliberal perspective. ‘Cruising is a political act … it’s not just about desire… there is a social and political dynamic there too … How is cruising happening, who is cruising what, where and how those politics are at play. 'Interesting reflective critique as gay male art. 'Very bruising, the scene is a foreign country, they do things differently there. Empty rhetoric that’s repeated so many times that it must mean something.' Trying to motivate you but not sure what it is motivating you to do. 'Such colourful imagery, very hypnotic, a real sense of urgency, like an imminent catastrophe.where's the manager?!!' bottom.… your work is definitely getting me thinking more about the contradictions of queerness under capitalism’ ‘Really compelling to me as someone interested about repetitive energies in queer life and digital space….top. CRUISE: A Reflective Critique of Seeing and Being Seen in The World of Gay Male Cruising (2021)