An unusual thing happened on a Saturday afternoon in October 2024 while doing the rounds of galleries in Chicago. Two neighboring galleries were showing work that addressed the same topic but in entirely different ways. Monique Meloche featured the work of David Antonio Cruz, and next door, Mariane Ibrahim showed the works of Leasho Johnson. Both are Latino; Cruz, born in 1974 in Philadelphia, is of Puerto Rican descent; Johnson, born in 1984, is originally from Jamaica. And both address what it means to be LGBTQ+ in their individual subculture.

        Cruz’s show, “David Antonio Cruz: Come Close Like Before,” contained nine works divided into two categories. There were four large drawings rendered in shades of taupe, blue-grey, and black. They depict overlaying and intertwined branches of olive trees and ceiba trees (native to Central America, the Caribbean, and West Africa). The images were inspired by Cruz’s memories from a recent visit to his grandparents’ land in Puerto Rico. They open the door to the main topic of his show as the intermingling of the different tree branches suggest the creation of a “hybrid” environment, one not strictly biologically related.

        His five much larger paintings, concentrate on the familial relationships LGBTQ+ people have with others who are not blood relatives. Their operating principle is: “We look out for and support each other.” This is brought home in iknowyou’vebeenwonderingwhere
i’vebeen:adrift,adraft,astare,atilt,asigh,exhale.
but,mebacktoletyouknow,gotathingforyou,andican’tletitgo the raft. In this massive diptych, six individuals recline on and around a couch. They are clearly very comfortable with each other and stare out to the viewer as if to say “you gotta problem with us?” Rendered realistically and in bright colors and patterns, they contrast dramatically with the tree branch drawings. Cruz uses several methods to bring extra tension to this work. First, the images in the two panels that make up the piece do not quite line up. This creates an unsettled sense when viewing. In a compositional way, it suggests that the members of this group, although close, are quite diverse. The central figure is a woman, and she is surrounded by five men of varying colors and ages. Second, there are shapes in the canvas that lack any shading and appear unfinished, like the blue and the chartreuse socks on the lower part of the left panel. Cruz is said to claim that these areas are included to bring attention to the abstractness of the composition. Third, and most jarring, is the presence of blue hands on several of the subjects. The compositions are so complex that, at first, you don’t notice them, but once you do, their presence tends to dominate. This stratagem seems to have some kind of symbolic meaning. Blue is associated with depth, stability, wisdom, faith and truth. Is Cruz associating these traits to the subjects with the blue hands?

        In his other dyptich icamebackthefollowingnightandwalkedthegroundslookingforyou,wegotturned
awayonthesecondnight,buticamebackagainandagain,andagain the mound., we see all three of these methods used again. But here, there are four women and two men on the same sofa—there are only two blue hands and the background is a version of the tree branch drawings. Again, the subjects stare out at the viewer with confrontational gazes. But, this painting is quieter; its palette is more subdued. Overall, it is not as provacative as the other diptych.

        The painting that struck me the most was not one of the group paintings, but a portrait of a bearded man in white, very open, fishnet stockings in an odalisque pose and wearing a white shirt and a ballcap. Scattered in front of him are a feather boa and strings of beads. comeclose,likebefore,sowecansitinsilenceandcloseoureyestothosewants, andmaybe,maybe,wecangetlostintheplacewherethebirdssleep,lostinthesummer
heat. is not about beefcake or drag; it is an unapologetic painting of someone who seems truly nonbinary. Which brings me to another major point of this show. There is no beefcake in this show; there is no over-the-top drag queen. There are only ordinary LGBTQ+ people who have developed a love for each other. How refreshing!

        Leasho Johnson’s “Escaping the Tyranny of Meaning” at Mariane Ibrahim Gallery has a completely different aesthetic from Cruz’s. But he addresses the same topic—being LGBTQ+ in a Latino subculture—this time, a Jamaican one. Most obviously, the pieces appear to all be loosely rendered abstractions with biomorphic shapes in very muted tones of beiges and with lots of black. It turns out that this style purposefully disguises content. In nearly every painting, there is a couple hidden among the loosely rendered vegetation, just waiting to be discovered. In a few, such as Like a Deep Breath Held and Held, the presence of the couple is easily discerned and occupies the center of the image. But gender is ambiguous. The taller one is probably male, judging from its height and slimness, but the gender of the smaller figure is not clear. The couple seem to be embracing next to the sea in the dark. This piece, which is placed early in the exhibition, for me, sets the tone for the show. It reminds me of the lyrics from Rogers and Hammerstein’s The King and I: “We kiss in a shadow, We hide from the moon, Our meetings are few, And over too soon.”

        There are two paintings in the show which are nearly mural sized: The Centipede under Two Skies (Anansi # 27) and The Man Disguised as Night (Anansi #29). Both of these paintings’ titles refer to Anansi, “a Ghana Akan folktale character associated with stories, wisdom, knowledge, and trickery, most commonly depicted as a spider,” according to Wikipedia. In The Centipede under Two Skies (Anansi # 27), there is a row of chairs with protruding human legs, and behind the chairs, there seems to be a bear-like creature, and behind that, warriors with shields. But all this is rendered so loosely that the shapes are open to varying interpretations. The only things definite are the chairs and the legs. There is a hint of a spider-like form in the center of the piece, depicted by thin, straight lines with sharp bends (spider legs?). The painting ends in a point on the right, suggesting an arrow, but pointing to what or where?

        The Man Disguised as Night (Anansi #29) is larger and not as dark. About half a dozen human figures can be discerned. In the center, some kind of domestic activity seems to be centered around a cube-shaped table. To the left of that table is a mouse-like creature that seems to reach into an opening in its side. Is this Anansi? To the table’s right in the background, there is a couple standing side-by-side, and on the left, there is a nude man with his back to us, bending down into some kind of thicket. In both paintings, many of the figures are hard to find as they become part of the “landscape,” disguised as night. This speaks to queerness in Jamaican culture as an underground existence, buried in code and disguise.

        There are a number of smaller paintings that address the conflict this imposes. Bumps and Brains and To Envy, to Want to Become, at least from their title, speak of the desire for a freer existence. Each painting has a black silhouette in which the “mouth” spews out what seems like banal statements (their brown color giving them a dull, unpleasant tone). But the forms inside their heads are graceful and colorful—the frustration of cultural censorship?

       These two artists confront their LGBTQ+ status in very different ways, and their positions seem to dictate their style of painting. David Antonio Cruz displays his gayness and uses it to build a familial sensibility that is loud, proud, and unapologetic. This approach results in bright, even garish colors and patterns that, somehow, end up blending into a cohesive whole that is both celebratory and confrontational. Leasho Johnson, on the other hand, bears the weight of Jamaican culture’s suppression of homosexuality. His paintings are muted, black being the dominant color. Figures are hidden in a tangle of semi-abstract forms. A sense of frustration and melancholy permeates his work, along with a desire to break free of those cultural constraints. These two shows revealed a thought-provoking contrast between two Caribbean cultures’ attitudes toward the LGBTQ+ community. They demonstrate how art can be a vital form of expression when dealing with what can sometimes be a difficult topic.

Michel Ségard is the Editor in Chief of the New Art Examiner and a former adjunct assistant professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He has been a published art critic for more than 45 years and is also the author of numerous exhibition catalog essays.