With the legalization of pornography and the unconscionable perils of “benign neglect,” Times Square became the red light capital of the Eastern Seaboard in the 1970s. As a sense of lawlessness took hold, the Great White Way quickly became the ultimate den of iniquity, where any desire could be satisfied—for a price. Brothels, strip clubs, XXX theaters, and sex shops beckoned visitors with the promise of pleasures of the flesh, while pimps, prostitutes, and hustlers strolled the streets all hours of the day and night, turning tricks for a quick buck.
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In 1978, Jane Dickson and Claudia Summers arrived in New York, and though they were often on the same scene for years, they wouldn’t formally meet until 2019. Dickson, a young artist, immediately got a gig working weekend nights as an animation designer operating the first computer lightboard at the Spectacolor Billboard at 1 Times Square. Summers, a musician and actress, wanted a flexible gig that would give her time to herself and began working in Times Square strip clubs in 1980. That same year, Guy Trebay commissioned Dickson to illustrate scenes from the Melody Burlesque for a series he was doing on Times Square for The Village Voice. It was Dickson’s first foray into strip clubs but it would not be her last.
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The following year, Dickson and her husband Charlie Ahearn moved into a dilapidated building on the corner of 42 Street and Eighth Avenue, where they lived until 1992, when it was finally slated for demolition. It was then that Dickson decided to return to strip clubs as a “working girl” on The Deuce to explore the clandestine world that catered to the fantasies of men, while lining the pockets of the mafia. In time, she would visit Show World, Scores, Chippendales, the Gaiety, the Melody Burlesque, Billy’s Topless, and Scores to create a series of paintings that have never been shown together—until now in the new exhibition, Hot, Hot, Hot. Here, Dickson and Summers share a multi-layered perspective of strip clubs as seen through the female gaze.
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