"Two Men in a Truck." Charcoal on a brown sheet of artist-folded paper. 11 3/4 x 10 3/4"; 17 3/4 x 11 3/4" (unfolded).
William (Bill) Rice was a noted member of the NYC East Village scene throughout the 1960s and 1980s. Enamored with the often gritty life of both the East and West Village, his works observed overlooked aspects of queer men of color in particular.

The infamous West Village truck cruising piers was popular with urban and suburban men, where the unlocked trucks under the old elevated Westside Highway became makeshift spaces for hook-up sex. As the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project notes about the Westside Highway cruising piers, which ran roughly from Christopher Street north to 14th Street along the waterfront: "A 1966 guidebook states, 'Go to the piers…between the trucks…,' referring to the trucks that were parked at night under the elevated West Side Highway. They were used for commerce during the day but were empty and unlocked at night, becoming a popular locale for public sex."

As a known cruising area, men risked arrest, particularly men of color, and even more so men of color together. Rice depicts both men looking out their windows, on the lookout, aware of the risk but willing to take it.

The art historical importance of the Westside cruising piers cannot be overstated. David Wojnarowicz and Keith Haring painted murals in the dilapidated shipping warehouses, photographers Arthur Tress and Peter Hujar took pictures of men and queer scenes, performers, like a young RuPaul, came of age on the Piers, and men from the boroughs hooked up with each other and the (bridge and tunnel) men from Long Island, Westchester and New Jersey; later, gay historically important clubs and bars, like the Mineshaft, took over the abandoned buildings on the opposite side of the highway and in the adjacent Meatpacking District and not far from what is now The Whitney Museum of American Art.

Provenance: estate of Bill Rice, courtesy of Steven Harvey Fine Art Projects, New York. Fold down the center of the sheet. Evidence of toning throughout.
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