A conversation with Patric McCoy, who photographed Black gay men enjoying themselves in 1980s Chicago

Seven years ago. That was the last time we caught a glimpse of activist art collector Patric McCoy’s work in relation to the intersection of art, AIDS and Chicago. In 2016, the cycling fan had five portraits of gay Black men taken in the 1980s featured in “Art AIDS America Chicago,” an Alphawood Gallery exhibition that sought to survey AIDS-related art and make a case for its lasting influence on the art world. Now, McCoy has his own exhibit at Lincoln Park’s Wrightwood 659 space featuring over two dozen pieces of his photography work of that era. The exhibit runs until July 15th.

“Patric McCoy: Take My Picture” includes 50 portraits of gay Black men taken on the streets of Chicago in the 1980s. Seven years ago, McCoy said he wasn’t an artist. He still attests to that, saying his skills lie in finding art and curating it in his North Kenwood condo to create an environment where every wall, ceiling and window is covered in art. He often opens up his home to people so they can learn about art collecting.

“These photographs have not been seen by anybody for almost 30 years,” he said. “They just sat in my closet.”

If you swing by his condo, McCoy will bring out a photo album of color images of young Black men in the ‘70s that he took with a 110 mm point-and-shoot camera. He also has black and white photos from his 35 mm camera, where one sees Black joy, everyday city living, fashion, smiles and even signs that show gas prices slightly over the $1 mark.

“Take My Picture” showcases images McCoy took from 1984-1989 as an exercise to learn how to use his 35 mm camera. He made a commitment to himself to take at least one picture a day. Riding his bike from his South Shore residence to the Loop back in the day, he’d always have his camera in tow, at the ready.

“People are asking me as they see me ride my bike past, ‘take my picture!’” McCoy said. “I ended up taking lots and lots and lots of pictures. I think some of it was on a lark, just to see if I would do it or not. I would not pose them ... tell them what to do or what not to do ... whatever they did, I took a picture of it. Because I had to carry the camera everywhere, I would take it to the clubs, so I’d be out on the dance floor with the camera.”

McCoy has also been working on compiling a book of photographs since 2017, but is still looking for support getting it published. He hopes that will change as his photographs stay out in the public. (McCoy said he’s already gotten a request for a mini show at the Hyde Park Historical Society in August and a Blanc Gallery show in October.)

“This is a show about men, me taking pictures of men during a time period in the ‘80s where all these things are happening that’s causing a lot of young men to be in the Loop,” McCoy said. Those circumstances include, among other things: the end of the sexual revolution, a more socially engaged Black populace in the Loop post-white flight and economic dire straits where large numbers of Black men were jobless, causing homeless camps to pop up. McCoy had to ride through those camps every day on his way to his Environmental Protection Agency job.

“Homeless shelters shifted from what I used to see in the ‘60s when it was all white indigent alcoholics. That was what the homeless shelters were all through the Loop, and single-room occupancies,” McCoy said. “By the time the ‘80s came, that shifted to young Black men. They were either escaping the gangs, escaping the projects, coming down for sexual recreation, coming down for socialization, because all the entertainment was out here.

He would often see people from the Grand Crossing, Woodlawn, Hyde Park and Bronzeville neighborhoods in the Loop when he was biking through.

“They were in this world of same gender loving ... the beginning of the gay world. It was at the end of the ‘80s that Black people started to warm up to the term of gay. Prior to that, they didn’t identify that way. They used verbs to describe what they were. ‘I’m just messing around. I’m just freaking out, trying to chill out.’”

McCoy smiles thinking about taking the photos. He said looking back on the endeavor allowed him to recognize how much men are like peacocks.

“Men are peacocks. Women don’t even come close,” he said. “Women would never ask me to take their picture. Women were never ready to be photographed. Men are always ready, no matter what he looks like. People would literally come out of the gutter and say take my picture.”

McCoy would take the pictures one day and then return the next to hand out photos to the subjects after he developed the pictures in the darkroom in his father’s South Shore basement. He says one can catch things in the background of the pictures that make one think “wow, that’s historical.”

“After they dried, I would put them in stacks and put them in my book bag and start the day over again,” McCoy, a North Kenwood resident said. “If you think about what this looks like compared to what those point and shoots were giving them, this is amazing. They had never seen themselves like this. And I was trying to make them look good. The camera became a sort of entry to starting conversations. You get to know them different from just a person on the street that you had momentary contact with.”

Now, McCoy said the gay community is all about being visible, but back in the ‘80s, the world he knew was about being invisible.

One place of interaction was Rialto Tap, the defunct gay bar in the South Loop, what McCoy called the “Black Cheers.”

“Everybody was coming there for their reasons — it was a gay place by our terms and by our terms, it would be a drug bar, a house head place because house music was just getting started and that was one of the hot spots for house music,” McCoy said. “It was a place where folks in three-piece suits would go coming out of the offices and would be down there with people just coming out of the homeless shelter. It was fun.”

Looking back, there’s also a sense of sadness with McCoy. He said the combination of AIDS and crack coming together in the ‘80s took a slice out of the population, at least 80% of his friends. It came in three waves from the mid-1980s through the ‘90s.

“The photojournalism that I did was inadvertent,” McCoy said. “I ended up capturing the scene of Black men enjoying themselves. And it was like they are partying on the Titanic because they don’t realize what’s getting ready to happen. Most of these folks are gone. It (AIDS) wiped out a whole generation of people.”

“Patric McCoy: Take My Picture” runs through July 15 at Wrightwood 659, 659 W. Wrightwood Ave.; more information at wrightwood659.org

drockett@chicagotribune.com