Book Works > Dianne Feinstein Doesn't Care Who You Sleep with, As Long As You're in Bed by 10 O'clock

Collaboration with Paul Pferdner

Utilizing two copies of the 1994 Jerry Roberts biography of Dianne Feinstein, the block is comprised of a double-needle linked-stitch binding used sculpturally as a deconstructed Girdle Book that climbs a ladder, representing the complicated but mutually beneficial relationship between the pioneering politician and the gay community of San Francisco. In the work, as in history, they mutually rise and depend on each other to stay aloft.

As a native San Franciscan, I grew up seeing Feinstein as a champion of women’s rights. She was a face that mirrored the unimaginable grief of our city after the assassination of Moscone and Milk. She was the first to many milestones, not the least of which an almost unblemished record of support for the gay community. As an adult, however, I have come to see the nuanced calculus of politics and the many needles she threaded to get to all those firsts, while sometimes using her schoolmarm persona to caution the very community whose votes he whipped, saying “too much” (bathhouses) and “too soon” (gay marriage). Ultimately though, both she and the gay community rose from the relationship. It is that which Paul and I have collaborated to depict.