Some Styles of Masculinity, Part 1: Rock Star
Gregg Bordowitz
New Museum of Contemporary Art
2/1/2018 2/1/2018

Some Styles of Masculinity, Part 1: Rock Star

Some Styles of Masculinity is a monologic journey that unfolds in three interconnected chapters over three consecutive evenings, entitled: Rock Star, Rabbi, and Comedian. Under the guise of The Benjamin Zev Show—equal parts television variety show, Catskill stand-up, bar mitzvah midrash, and punk-rock listening session—Bordowitz masterfully improvises each chapter’s preoccupations with a stack of reference books at the ready. Together, the three evenings present a humorous and heartfelt vision of Bordowitz’ complicated masculinity as an artist, writer, and cultural observer.

Some Styles of Masculinity, Part 1: Rock Star: Trigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon

Three Lectures on Styles of Masculinity:

1) Rock Star
Glamorous androgynous promiscuous bisexuality mixed with borough realness


2) Rabbi
Erudite gourmand dark eyes peering through thick-lens eyeglasses pale skin bearded wearing satin and fur in somber colors championing the invective


3) Comedian
Quick angry socially relevant humor accompanied by a gross overestimation of responsibility rendered powerless by morbid self-loathing


In the premiere of this three-part performance-lecture series, titled Some Styles of Masculinity (2017) and presented as part of the exhibition “Trigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon,” Gregg Bordowitz explored tropes of masculinity that have been formative to his own coming-of-age. Each evening, Bordowitz considered a different seminal figure: the rock star, the rabbi, or the comedian. Key Yiddish words for all three are farbissenerrakhmones, and schpilkesSome Styles of Masculinity extends Bordowitz’s understanding of gender as “bound up, entangled, with ethnic, religious, and national identities as well as sexuality, race, and class.”

Performance Dates:

January 19 2018
January 20 2018
January 21 2018

“Trigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon” investigates gender’s place in contemporary art and culture at a moment of political upheaval and renewed culture wars. The exhibition features an intergenerational group of artists who explore gender beyond the binary to usher in more fluid and inclusive expressions of identity.

Host organizations New Museum of Contemporary Art

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