Let’s Talk About Reading! Coffee-Table Book Edition

In the iconic words of Venus Xtravaganza…. “You want to talk about reading? Lets talk about reading!”

We’ve complied a list of 10 LGBT+ themed coffee-table-books, photo essays and biographical picture books that illustrates the queer experience centering in NYC nightlife.

Voguing and the House Ballroom Scene of New York, 1989-92
by Stuart Baker (Editor) | Chantal Regnault (Photographer)

In 1989, Malcolm McLaren had his only number one hit with a single called “Deep in Vogue.” Early the next year, Madonna had one of the biggest hits of her career, with the single “Vogue,” and when Jennie Livingston’s film Paris Is Burning arrived in cinemas the same year, winning the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, the mainstream got hip to New York City’s extraordinary ball culture, from which the film and McLaren and Madonna’s songs had arisen. Paris Is Burning documented a gay ballroom scene that emerged in Harlem in the mid-1980s, which drew African American and Latino gay and transgender communities to compete against one another for their dancing skills, the verisimilitude of their drag and their ability to walk on the runway. Photographer Chantal Regnault spent many years recording this scene, from which the dance style known as voguing arose. A visual riot of fashion, polysexuality and subversive style, Voguing and the Ballroom Scene of New York 1989–1992 is also an extraordinary document on sexuality and race.

New York: Club Kids
by Walt Cassidy

New York: Club Kids is a high-impact visual diary of New York City in the 1990s, seen through the eyes of Walt Cassidy, known as Waltpaper, a central figure within the Club Kids. The Club Kids―named thus by New York Magazine in 1988―were an artistic, fashion-conscious youth movement that crossed over into the public consciousness through appearances on daytime talk shows, magazine editorials, fashion campaigns and music videos, planting the seeds for popular cultural trends such as reality television, self-branding, “influencers” and the gender revolution.

Known for their outrageous looks, legendary parties and sometimes illicit antics, the Club Kids were the embodiment of Generation X and would prove to be the last definitive subculture group of the analog world. The ’90s have come to be known as the last discernible and cohesive decade, cherished by those who experienced it and romanticized by those who missed it.

On Christopher Street: Transgender Stories
by Mark Seliger (Photographer), Janet Mock (Foreword)

On Christopher Street there are all kinds of sexual orientations and gender identities, endless possibilities of potential selves: transgender, transsexual, non-binary, genderqueer, femme, butch, cross-dresser, drag kings, drag queens, and many other identities that shift, adapt, and challenge our understanding of gender. This street nestled in the middle of New York City’s Greenwich Village is heralded as the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ rights movement. Today, the intersection at Christopher and Hudson Streets has been renamed “Sylvia Rivera Way,” after the pioneering trans-activist and the annual LGBTQ pride parade ends its procession on Christopher Street, where the revolution began at the Stonewall Inn.

Renowned photographer Mark Seliger, best known for his portraits of celebrities, musicians, and artists, has called the West Village home for nearly two decades. For his latest book, On Christopher Street: Transgender Stories, his curiosity inspired him to shoot a handful of portraits—documentary style—in hopes of capturing the color, flamboyant characters, and theatre of a famous, but vanishing neighborhood.

Andy Warhol. Polaroids
by Richard B. Woodward  (Author), Reuel Golden (Editor)

Andy Warhol was a relentless chronicler of life and its encounters. Carrying a Polaroid camera from the late 1950s until his death in 1987, he amassed a huge collection of instant pictures of friends, lovers, patrons, the famous, the obscure, the scenic, the fashionable, and himself. Created in collaboration with the Andy Warhol Foundation, this book features hundreds of these instant photos.

Portraits of celebrities such as Mick Jagger, Alfred Hitchcock, Jack Nicholson, Yves Saint Laurent, Pelé, Debbie Harry are included alongside images of Warhol’s entourage and high life, landscapes, and still lifes from Cabbage Patch dolls to the iconic soup cans. Often raw and impromptu, the Polaroids document Warhol’s era like Instagram captures our own, offering a unique record of the life, world, and vision behind the Pop Art maestro and modernist giant.

Legendary: Inside the House Ballroom Scene
by Gerard H. Gaskin  (Author)

Gerard H. Gaskin’s radiant color and black-and-white photographs take us inside the culture of house balls, underground events where gay and transgender men and women, mostly African American and Latino, come together to see and be seen. At balls, high-spirited late-night pageants, members of particular “houses”—the House of Blahnik, the House of Xtravaganza—”walk,” competing for trophies in categories based on costume, attitude, dance moves, and “realness.” In this exuberant world of artistry and self-fashioning, people often marginalized for being who they are can flaunt and celebrate their most vibrant, spectacular selves.

From the quiet backstage, to the shimmering energies of the runway. to the electricity of the crowd, Gaskin’s photographs take us to the ball. Legendary, comprised of photos taken at events in the New York city area, Philadelphia, Richmond, and Washington, D.C., is a collaboration between Gaskin, a camera-laden outsider who has been attending balls for twenty years, and the house members who let him enter the intimate world of ball culture.

Lettin It All Hang Out
by RuPaul  (Author)

The world’s best-known drag performer tells of his rise from poverty to superstardom and offers beauty tips, positive thinking tools, and his unique sense of humor in a first book filled with photographs.

Drag: The Complete Story (A Look at the History and Culture of Drag)
by Simon Doonan (Author)

Drag is transformation, communication and, above all, exaggeration, where gender non–conformity is the plat du jour. Drag: The Complete Story observes this increasingly complex world by exploring drag’s journey through the twentieth century.

Corralled into thematic chapters, including glamor drag, art drag, butch drag, black drag, historical drag, comedy drag and popstar drag, this book is the first flamboyant and poignant survey of drag culture.

Drag: The Complete Story is not just for fabulous queens and drag enthusiasts, but for anyone interested in gender fluidity and the culture surrounding it.

Studio 54
by Ian Schrager (Editor), Bob Colacello (Foreword)

There has never been—and will never be—another nightclub to rival the sheer glamour, energy, and wild creativity that was Studio 54. Now, in the first official book on the legendary club, co-owner Ian Schrager presents a spectacular volume brimming with star-studded photographs and personal stories from the greatest party of all time. From the moment it opened in 1977, Studio 54 celebrated spectacle and promised a never-ending parade of anything goes. Although it existed for only three years, it served as a catalyst that brought together some of the most famous and creative people in the world. It quickly became known for its celebrity guest list and uniquely chic clientele. From the cutting-edge lighting displays to its elaborate sets, it was the beginning of nightclub as performance art. Now, Studio 54 explores this cultural zeitgeist and gives us Schrager’s personal firsthand account of what it was like to create and run the most famous nightclub of our age. With hundreds of photographs, many of which have never been seen before, of the celebrities and beautiful people and engaging stories and quotes from such cultural luminaries as Liza Minelli, David Geffen, Brooke Shields, Pat Cleveland, and Diane von Furstenberg, this exciting volume depicts the wild energy and glittering creativity of the era. One of the most important cultural landmarks of the twentieth century, Studio 54 continues to inspire with its legendary glamour. This exhilarating volume is a must-have for style and fashion aficionados today.

The Drag Queens of New York: An Illustrated Field Guide
by Julian Fleisher  (Author)

An entertaining journey inside the glittering drag world of New York City provides interviews with RuPaul, Lypsinka, and other notable drag queens as they reveal the secrets of Manhattan’s turbulent and glamorous popular culture.

We Are Everywhere: Protest, Power, and Pride in the History of Queer Liberation
by Matthew Riemer  (Author), Leighton Brown  (Author)

Through the lenses of protest, power, and pride, We Are Everywhere is an essential and empowering introduction to the history of the fight for queer liberation. Combining exhaustively researched narrative with meticulously curated photographs, the book traces queer activism from its roots in late-nineteenth-century Europe–long before the pivotal Stonewall Riots of 1969–to the gender warriors leading the charge today. Featuring more than 300 images from more than seventy photographers and twenty archives, this inclusive and intersectional book enables us to truly see queer history unlike anything before, with glimpses of activism in the decades preceding and following Stonewall, family life, marches, protests, celebrations, mourning, and Pride. By challenging many of the assumptions that dominate mainstream LGBTQ+ history, We Are Everywhere shows readers how they can–and must–honor the queer past in order to shape our liberated future.

“Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever. It remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.” – Aaron Siskind