prev / next

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

About A Friend of The Friend

History is not a linear progression towards progress. It is not a list of dates and figures. It is also not a pastoral utopia we should aim to return to. The “history of History” tells us there is no one single narrative of the past. Our interpretation of historical events is an ongoing conversation with contemporary values and desires.

Lauren H. Griffin spent fifteen years working in museums and public history before returning to a career as a potter. During the 2020 pandemic, Black Lives Matter protests, and both Trump administrations, they saw firsthand how politics and public opinion challenge collective historical narratives. A Friend of The Friend asks the viewer to consider their own interpretations of history and the values given to well-known catechisms from the American past.

In 1776, The Public Universal Friend declared their independence from the tyranny of gender; announcing they were a genderless divine spirit sent to help prepare for the Second Coming. The Friend and their followers preached in the Quaker tradition in Mid-Atlantic states before starting an egalitarian religious settlement in New York. In the past this figure has been interpreted as either a grifting woman or a quirky historical footnote. Historians now see The Friend as a possible early example of a non-binary gender identity.

A Friend of The Friend uses commonly known motifs from American history and contemporary queer culture through the lens of object interpretation and historical reproduction to suggest a thriving queer past that dates back to the founding of the United States. Phrases like “Old Hat,” or “Call it Macaroni,” and figures like the Chevalier d’Eon and the Public Universal Friend are known to us today but have origins in queer 18th century culture.

Two hundred and fifty years of existence and Americans are grappling with the same questions our country asked at its founding: who receives the rights and privileges of full citizenship in America? As The Friend (and many other figures) demonstrate, white, land-owning men were not the only people in America in 1776, and they are not the only people in America today.

The call to “Make America Great Again” is a desire to return to a past where only certain individuals are considered people. While held up as a historical ideal (and thus a state to return to), this interpretation is as much a utopian fantasy as an egalitarian commune led by a transgender Friend.

Griffin’s work tells us that what we desire to exist in the past tells us who we are in the present. A Friend of The Friend proposes a return to the traditional American values of Liberty, Community and Equality.

This work is currently on view at the District Clay Center.

About A Friend of The Friend