"Barbara" Original
"Barbara" is a hand drawn polygonal drawing on 11 x 14" Bristol board paperusing micron marker, prismacolor colored pencils, mars black acrylic paint and hand stamped with antique letter stamps and white ink. Original comes Matted and Framed.
Barbara Gittings was a prominent American activist for LGBT equality. She organized the New York chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis (DOB) from 1958-1963, edited the national DOB magazines The Ladder 1963-66, and worked closely with Frank Kameny in the 1960's on the first picket lines that brought attention to the ban on employment of gay people by the largest employer in the US at the time; the United States government. Her early experiences with trying to learn more about lesbianism fueled her lifetime work with libraries. In the 1970's, Gittings was most involved in the American Library Association, especially it's gay caucus, the first such in a professional organization, in order to promote positive literature about homosexuality in libraries. She was a part of the movement to get the American Psychiatric Association to drop homosexuality as a mental illness in 1972. Her self-described life mission was to tear away the "shroud of invisibility" related to homosexuality, which had theretofore been associated with crime and mental illness.
20% of the proceeds go directly to Video Out an organization that emboldens members of the LGBTQIA+ community to share their stories.