OREGON’S LGBTO NEWSMAGAZINE
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JUNE 3.2011 2 7
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p o r c \u e n o + a c o * .c o m
Ig jif
“About eight months ago, I woke up
for the third day and read about the
bullying and suicide of LGBT kids
and I said to myself that I had to
do something. What could I do that
would touch these kids and make
them feel okay about who they are?”
-DAL RAY WILLIAMS
W illiams exists as two personas in the
world. “I kept coming up against the prob
lem that my photography and painting
looked as if it was made by different hands,
or different people,” he says. To solve this
issue, he created “Dal Ray W illiams” as a
second name for himself. “For me it was
chaos, so 1 devised a filing system for my
head,” he explains. “Darrell W illiamson
takes photographs and Dal Ray paints.”
W illiams’ creative process is likewise
complex. One of the exhibit’s pieces depicts
the glowing face o f Harvey Milk. W illiams’
approach begins with the background.
“Harvey’s background is bright and cheerful
as I imagine he was,” he says. “W ithin the
background are textile prints, some o f which
I designed and some [of which] I didn’t.”
He then moves on to other aspects of the
subject’s life: “First, if you read about him, his
life was somewhat o f a patchwork. He was in
Above left: Quentin Crisp
Above right: Bayard Rustin
the military, an accountant, then a hippie,
then a shop owner and then an elected offi
cial. There is patchwork to symbolize this.
There is a fabric print within this that is o f
hollow-nosed bullets. There are five slash
marks o f a handgun damask fabric to account
for how many times he was shot.”
Painting is W illiams’ final step. “I paint
the portraits in white only. I’ve done this
since about 1984,” he says. “The reason I do
this is that I believe there is an innocence to
the people I paint or draw— sort o f
angelic.”
The future bodes well for Queer Academy.
Its next stop is California for a December
show at the San Francisco LG BT Com mu
nity Center. Since this round’s focus is on
men, the next iteration of Queer Academy will
be on women. “I’m not certain when it will be
finished because I want to put down the
brush for a little while and shoot some pho
tos,” Williams says.
“I already have the fabrics for Gertrude
Stein and Marlene Dietrich. Also, I would
like to get a grant for Part Two.”’ TW
Queer Academy opens Sat., June 4 with a re
ception from 6 to 10 p.m. The gallery is open
noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sun. Disjecta is located at
8371 N. Interstate Ave. Visit disjecta.org.
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