EVE FOWLER

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bobby with a y. bobby with a tie.

When i met Bobby they always wore a tie. I met Bobby in 2001 and they always wore a tie. If you saw Bobby they were wearing a tie. Without question.

And a nice shirt that was made by a tailor. And pants that were also tailored. They were jeans. Tailored jeans. And very expensive trainers, as Bobby would say. Not sneakers, trainers.

Bobby is German. They grew up in a village somewhere in Germany I don’t know exactly where.

Bobby’s mom would sew the clothes they requested–even in college and grad school. Bobby would send a request and their mother would comply.

When Bobby was very young they played soccer very well on a team with mostly boys. Bobby was asked to leave the team even though they were an excellent player. From Bobby’s kitchen window there was a view of the soccer field which was tantamount to torture and added insult to injury. Bobby’s dad, noticing how sad they looked staring out from the kitchen window at the boys playing soccer, decided to buy them a ping pong table. Within a few months they were playing competitively and winning every game. They were winning in every direction. They were boarding a bus in a little uniform and were driven here and there winning every game. Bobby was just a child, traveling around Germany beating everyone at ping pong.

Bobby has very good taste and high expectations. Most of these expectations can’t really be met by Americans but Bobby forgives us. Easily. The thing is that Bobby can do most things and can make most things very well. And they try. They try to make everything very well. We don’t try to make things well. We just don’t care. Americans. We don’t care because we are used to plastic and kmart and, in general, junk. But when we see Bobby’s things we say “oh I you made that? How can i get one of those? That looks really nice”. They probably think we don’t know how to do anything. They are absolutely right. We don’t. But Bobby is good at most things. Here’s a list of things they are good at;

Personal politics

making shelves, clothes, bag, making the house nice. Picking objects for the house and clothes.

Bringing people together.

Thinking

making decisions

reading–taste in books

I have a feeling making art

helping friends

I have to come back to this list later. It will be a long list.

The reason I am writing this brief description of my good friend Bobby is because I am practicing remembering something. I am practicing remembering gender non conforming pronouns. Out of respect.

Also, I enjoy remembering key things about Bobby. The gender pronoun preference isn’t the key thing about Bobby. All these other things make Bobby who they are but they are more sensitive and compassionate having had to deal with a parade of idiots who think a boy is a boy and girl is a girl.

Or waiters who want to know how you ladies are doing tonight.

Eve Fowler was born in Philadelphia, in 1964, she lives and works in Los Angeles. She graduated from of Temple University (BA, 1986) and Yale University (MFA, 1992), and organises Artist Curated Projects in Los Angeles. Recent solo exhibitions include Participant Inc, New York; Fourteen30 Contemporary, Portland; Mier Gallery, Los Angeles and Artspace, Sydney. Her work was included in SITES OF REASON: A SELECTION OF RECENT ACQUISITIONS at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and in the MANIFEST DESTINY billboard project, organized by LAND in 2014. Her book ANYONE TELLING ANYTHING IS TELLING THAT THING was published by Printed Matter in 2013. Her second book, HUSTLERS, was published in 2014 by Capricious Publishing. Fowler’s work is included collections such as The Los Angeles County Museum of Art; The Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, San Fransisco; and The Smithsonian Institute, Washington, DC.

www.artistcuratedprojects.com