Gerardo Velazquez

After attending Stevenson Middle school, Velazquez received his MFA at California State University, Los Angeles in 1990^[1] after creating his own course study over 15 years in a wide range of disciplines: "literary studies, genetics, human sexuality, visual studies, musicology, digital technology, and religious studies."^[2] After his AIDs diagnosis, Velazquez turned to activism with a series of self-published zines such as The Annals of Selective Annihilation: Interplanetary Journal for the Retention of Power Through the Elimination of a Targeted Population (1990) and The Gay Death List: The Magazine of Art and Opportunistic Investments (1990).^[3]

Velazquez died in 1992 of AIDS-related complications at age 33.^[4] His papers are held at the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives.

Gerardo Velazquez created art in a multitude of media. He wrote poems such as "Falsetto Boy", and many others that were performed for a spoken word album Voices of the Angels. ^[5] He created painting like "The Neglected Martyr" which spoke to his many academic disciplines incorporating religious iconography into his artwork.^[6] Much of his artwork revolved around his band, creating many graphic band flyers, music videos, and synth scores.^[7]

Posthumously, his work has been exhibited in such exhibitions as the Axis Mundo: Queer Networks in Chicano L.A. at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles in 2017 and the 2023-24 touring exhibition Copy Machine Manifestos: Artists Who Make Zines that travelled to the Brooklyn Museum and the Vancouver Art Gallery.^[8]

The band Nervous Gender formed in October 1978. Members of the band when it first started were Michael Ochoa, Phranc, Edward Stapleton, and Gerardo.^[9] Nervous Gender was known for their confrontational and antagonistic performances that was unapologetically queer and anti-Catholic in theme. The band still continues to perform, most recently in March 2015.^[10]