David Wojnarowicz - Tongues of Flame

Publisher: Illinois State University Galleries
Year: 1992
Format: Softcover
Edition: 2nd Edition
Condition: New
Pages: 128

Tongues of Flame is one of the last books that was published during the lifetime of the artist, writer and activist David Wojnarowicz. Known for documenting the cultural turbulence of his generation, he was described by William S. Burroughs as “[having] caught the age-old voice of the road, the voice of the traveler, the outcast, the thief, the whore, the same voice that was heard in Villon’s Pairs, in the Rome of Petronius.”

Tongues of Flame accompanied Wojnarowicz’s 1990 exhibition at the Illinois State University Galleries which showcased a vast retrospective of works from video, to paintings, photography and drawings. 700 people joined for the opening, witnessing Wojnarowicz speak passionately about safe sex, lack of AIDS funding, and the death of queer rights. From 1990–1991 the Tongues of Flame exhibition travelled to the Santa Monica Museum, Exit Art in New York and Temple Gallery & Tyler Gallery at Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, resulting in a second edition of the book published in 1992.