The Art of Looking

Have you heard of Charles Leslie? Thomas Mann pinched his butt. He has the biggest penis collection in the world. He is one of the fathers of modern New York SoHo. And he’s the co-founder of the first museum for gay and lesbian art. The story of his life is as incredible as it is unknown. Now it will be released under the title The Art of Looking―The Life and Treasures of Collector Charles Leslie. An epic photo book that is much more than a mere biography. Bestselling author Dr. Kevin Clarke (Beards―An Unshaved History, Porn―From Warhol to X-Tube) tells the story of Charles Leslie: soldier, actor, art collector, lover, globetrotter, gay activist, museum founder. The author guides us through the stages of an exciting life―a life that reflects the major turning point of Gay Liberation from the 1950s until today. The book is illustrated with numerous images from Charles Leslie’s private archive, studded with witty anecdotes and historical background information.

About the author

The German-Irish publicist Dr. Kevin Clarke was born in Berlin in 1967. He studied musicology and literature at the Freie Universität Berlin and the University of Milan before working as a journalist for the newspaper Der Tagesspiegel and the magazines Bunte and Playboy. From 2003 onwards he wrote for the opera magazine Orpheus and De Groene Amsterdammer from the Netherlands. He produced a series of broadcasts for the German radio station SWR on Composers in Exile and wrote his PhD on Emmerich Kálmán and the Transatlantic Operetta 1928-1932. In 2007, his books Glitter and be Gay: Authentic Operetta and Its Gay Admirers and The White Horse Inn: The History of an International Success were published. In 2009, he gave a lecture on The Pornography of Operetta at the University of Amiens, which kicked off his current interest in the general history of porn. In 2006, Clarke founded the Operetta Research Center Amsterdam of which he is the director. He teaches at the Conservatory of Tilburg and was curator of the 2010 exhibition Erik Charell and the Homosexuality of Operetta at the Schwule Museum Berlin. From 2011-2013 he was editor-in-chief of the German magazine Männer.