In the summer of 2022, she performed in the Double Edge Theatre production of Hidden Territories of the Bacchae. Since 2014, she has been part of the development of the eco-cultural theater experience Ezell: Ballad of a Land Man, and is part of the national tour of Ezell in 2021-2023. Originally from Chicago, she now resides in Rockcastle County, Kentucky, where she nurtures a multi-year collaboration with Clear Creek Creative. She is a Master Trainer with TimeSlips Creative Storytelling, and was forever changed by her experience manifesting wildly creative projects in rural Kentucky nursing homes in collaboration with staff and residents in 2018-2019. She is an active member of Alternate ROOTS and an Appalachian Teaching Artist Fellow through Berea College Partners for Education. Her work has been supported by the Live Art Development Agency of the UK, Alternate ROOTS, the Illinois Arts Council, the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. In 2005, Nicole created HEAT:05, a durational art project in which she performed every day of the year in order to mark 10 years since the 1995 Chicago heat wave disaster. In 2010, Nicole collaborated with DJ Erik Roldan to curate and host Northern Lights, a monthly queer performance and dance party in Chicago. In 2012, she lived in Denmark as part of the Living Copenhagen artist residency, and then continued to tour in Europe, creating participatory UPRISING performances in Russia, UK, and Portugal. Performing Revolutionary was written in response to the UPRISING project-5 years of monthly outdoor performances exploring practices of revolution. In 2022, a fully accessible audiobook version of Performing Revolutionary was released, narrated by Nicole Garneau. Her book Performing Revolutionary: Art, Action, Activismwas published in print in Spring 2018 by Intellect. The Bijou has never been pretty it has always been deliciously nasty and I'll keep it that way till I'm done, then I'll turn off the lights and go home.Nicole Garneau is an interdisciplinary artist making site-specific performance and project art that is directly political, critically conscious, and community building. It is what sex was in the 1970s and '80s. "There is nothing in the world like the Bijou. People are still coming out at the Bijou, we have a lot of return customers, regulars, married men, tourists who come to the big city to experience what they would never do back home, people who want to see porn in a sexual environment with other men, people that want anonymous sex. We're always getting in new people from Chicago who have heard of us, seen our ads. "The Bijou is too intimidating young men have to get to know themselves better. "The Bijou customer, since the first day I opened the theater, has never been young, the 18-to-25-year-old crowd," Toushin said. He told Windy City Times in 2011 that the previous five years had been difficult, given the advent of Internet pornography and a reduced amount of convention business in the city. He has had a number of legal skirmishes over the years, including a conviction for tax evasion in the late '80s and a number of obscenity indictments. Toushin was put in charge of the Bijou in 1970 the venue began showing gay films exclusively in 1978. I received vacation and sick pay places that do that for a part-time job, I imagine, are few and far between these days."īijou World, Toushin's mail-order and online video business, will remain open, but Toushin said he did not yet know where it will relocate to. They were gay-friendly, lesbian-friendly and trans-friendly there. He said, "I got to see the gay community evolve in that place. "We appreciate and thank the gay community, and have been grateful to be a part of it for 46 years."Īctivist Michael O'Connor has had a part-time job at the theater for several years, and said he'll miss it. "I'm working with David Boyer at Touche to put together something for the last week so that we can go out on a high note," he said. When reached for comment, Toushin told Windy City Times that he had "little to add" beyond the message. "I wanted to have a bit more time if I was going to close down after all these years." "It's not the way I wanted to go out," he said. Ownership changes of buildings and leases change."īijou cannot move because its license is tied to the location, he added. "The end of days has come to Bijou after 46 years," Toushin said in the message. Its last full 24-hour day of operation will be Sept. 30.Īccording to a recorded message left by owner Steve Toushin at the theater's phone number, Bijou lost its lease at its longtime Old Town location.
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