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Future Perfect: Build the Bureau

The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is a queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space seeking funds to secure a permanent site with a cafe.

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Future Perfect: Build the Bureau

Future Perfect: Build the Bureau

Future Perfect: Build the Bureau

Future Perfect: Build the Bureau

Future Perfect: Build the Bureau

The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is a queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space seeking funds to secure a permanent site with a cafe.

The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is a queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space seeking funds to secure a permanent site with a cafe.

The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is a queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space seeking funds to secure a permanent site with a cafe.

The Bureau of General Services—Queer Division is a queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space seeking funds to secure a permanent site with a cafe.

Greg Newton
Greg Newton
Greg Newton
Greg Newton
1 Campaign |
New York, United States
$20,240 USD 341 backers
40% of $50,000 Flexible Goal Flexible Goal

logo

Our Story

We are Donnie Jochum and Greg Newton, the founders of the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division, a queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space.

NYC lost two important queer resources when A Different Light closed in 2001 and Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop closed in 2009. These closings inspired us to create a space where queers could not only find books by and about ourselves, but also find each other, share ideas, exhibit art, perform, listen to each other, inspire and encourage one another, and enjoy each other’s work and company.

We launched the Bureau on November 15, 2012 at Strange Loop Gallery on the Lower East Side of New York City, where we remained through the end of August. 

Cage is now hosting the Bureau for the months of September and October, while we continue to raise funds and seek a permanent space. Cage is located at 83A Hester Street, between Orchard and Hester Streets.

From the outset our aim has been to foster a community invested in the values of mindfulness, intellectual curiosity, justice, compassion, and playfulness. We have sought to excite and educate a self-confident, sex-positive, and supportive queer community by offering books, publications, and art and by hosting readings, performances, film screenings, lectures, reading groups, and workshops. Since we opened we have provided local and visiting queers and friends with an open and inclusive space for dialogue and socializing. We are thrilled with people’s enthusiastic responses to this project!

 

What We’ve Done

Since November 15th, 2012 we have hosted over 100 free or donation-supported events with such significant members of the queer community as Sarah Schulman, Edmund White, Martin Duberman, Christopher Bram, Pamela Sneed, Laurie Weeks, Charles-Rice Gonzalez, Cynthia Carr, Penny Arcade, Filip Noterdaeme, Daniel Isengart, Bruce Benderson, Eileen Myles, Annie Lanzillotto, Thomas Glave, and Genesis Breyer P-Orridge.

Schulman Myles Genesis

Sneed White Glave Rice-Gonzalez

In May Tim Trace Peterson, co-editor of Troubling the Line: Trans and Genderqueer Poetry and Poetics, presented contributors to this anthology, including Aimee HermanAriel GoldbergEC CrandallEileen MylesEly ShipleyJaime Shearn CoanJake Pam DickJoy Ladin, and Kit Yan.

Troubling the Line and The Collection

In June we presented an evening of readings by 2013 nominees for Lambda Literary Awards, including Stephen S. Mills, Barry Webster, William Sterling Walker, Sarah Schulman, Tom Cardamone, Rae Spoon and several contributors to The Collection: Short Fiction From The Transgender VanguardRyka Aoki, Red Durkin, Adam Halwitz, Casey Plett, and Carter Sickels.

Sami YoYo Labs Nick Gio 

We’ve collaborated with several small independent presses in showcasing their authors, including Publication Studio, Sibling Rivalry PressPapercut PressLethe Press,  Chelsea Station Editions, and Portable Press @ Yo-Yo Labs.

Durbin, Luxe, Acs, Speedwagon

The Bureau has also hosted events with emerging talents such as Max Steele, Ella Boureau, Stephen Boyer, Lonely Christopher, Andrew Durbin, Ariel Speedwagon, Shane Shane, Gio Black Peter, and Susan Hwang's Bushwick Book Club, to name just a few. 

Ella, Bad Grammar, Zee, Max

We have exhibited art works by Scott Hug, Eve Fowler, Joe Mama-Nitzberg, Chris Bogia, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Sam Gordon, Robert Melee, A.K. Burns, Thomas Engel Hart, Nathan Vincent and many others.

 Hug Hull-Sepuya Mama-Nitzberg

The Bureau collaborates with community organizations such as Visual AIDS, the AIDS activist organization, which worked with us twice to present important works about AIDS by artists that it supports. In April we hosted a benefit organized by Paul VanDeCarr for Silvia’s Place, an emergency shelter for LGBTQ homeless youth. The Bureau has also contributed to fundraising campaigns for the Ali Forney Center, which provides housing to homeless LGBT youth, and to Geeks OUT, promoters of the queer geek community. We plan to expand our involvement in the many queer communities in NYC and beyond by forming mutually supportive relationships with individuals and organizations alike.

 

Phillips, Rupe, Noh

This summer the Bureau and Peter M. HargrovePresident of Hargrove Entertainment, Inc., presented Queer Film Summer Camp, a series devoted to queer films or films viewed queerly. An exciting array of film critics and historians along with other queer and queer-friendly NYC-based arts professionals introduces each film with a brief lecture. These include Tony Phillips, Shade Rupe, David Noh, and Genesis Breyer P-Orridge.

 

Press

 

Best of New York

 

Time Out NY logo

Time Out New York 50 reasons

 Time Out NY logo

Time Out New York 100 Best Shops

MetroSource logo

Metro Source


  • Next Magazine gave the Bureau a great plug in its August 29th issue. Will Pulos wrote that giving the Bureau a permanent home would be one of five things that he’d like mayoral candidates to promise in order to earn his vote! Thanks, Will!

In his own words:


  • GAYLETTER interview with the Bureau posted on September 11, 2013


More press on our website.


What We Need

In order for this vital queer cultural center, bookstore, and event space to continue serving you we need to raise $50,000 in 50 days. We will use this money to secure a rental storefront on the Lower East Side, build the store, purchase necessary equipment and furniture, launch a small café, and establish an e-commerce page on our website. The addition of a café and an e-commerce page on our website will play a crucial role in making the Bureau a sustainable project by providing additional revenue. But we cannot achieve these goals without your financial contributions to our Indiegogo campaign.

UPDATE (9/11/13): Many people have asked us what we will do if we don't reach our original goal of $50K. This is our answer. Our primary goal is to keep the Bureau going, and our fundamental requirement is space. We are seeking a a 450 to 500 sqare foot space on the Lower East Side with a monthly rent of approximately $3,000. We will need three months rent up front to take the space off the market and the first month's rent. At this point we seem to have that covered given that we've received $15,585 as of this posting at 6:20 on 9/11/13. But we will also need some money to fix the space up, purchase signage, and get the space ready for business and events. We estimate that we'll need about $5K or $6K for that. So our revised goal is $18K. If we reach this, then we can at least move forward in our own space. 

Of course, we very much hope that we will exceed $18K. Receiving the funds to add a cafe and an e-commerce page to our website would help to make the Bureau more financially stable--so we don't have to keep begging you for money! But if those projects have to wait, so be it. And we can always receive donations through our fiscal sponsor, Fractured Atlas, even after our Indiegogo campaign ends on Friday at noon. Our goal is simply to make the Bureau of General Services-Queer Division a stable project that continues to provide a much-needed space for queer books, periodicals, zines, art, performers, authors, poets, artists, activists, scholars, readers, and audiences.

So please donate today in order to put the Bureau on firm ground!


BGSQD is a sponsored project of Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. Contributions for the purposes of Bureau of General Services—Queer Division must be made payable to Fractured Atlas and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. 

  

What You Get

You will get the satisfaction of knowing that you are helping to secure the future of the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division’s own space so that we may continue to serve you. In addition, many of the Bureau’s friends have offered their time, writings, art, books, and other gifts so that we can reward you for your generous donations.

Art works have been donated by Gio Black PeterPaul Mpagi Sepuya (sold out)Goodyn Green (sold out)Carlos Motta, Nathan Vincent and Bryan Raughton(sold out)Kevin KillianEve FowlerWayne KoestenbaumThomas Engel Hart, Bryson Rand, Lee Brozgol, Alesia Exum, Sam Gordon, Bryson Rand, Ethan Shoshan, and Larry Krone.

Donated books include James Saslow’s Pictures and Passions: A History of Homosexuality in the Visual Arts (sold out), Annie Lanzillotto’s L Is for Lion and Schistong, and Visual AIDS’s Not Over: 25 Years of Visual AIDS (sold out).

Motta Peter

Hart Green Vincent

Sepuya Fowler Killian

Donors of $50 and up can select perks that include a book that the Bureau will publish with Publication Studio featuring contributions by Andrew Durbin (who will edit the book), Lonely ChristopherStephen BoyerMax Steele,Pamela SneedGio Black PeterPaul Mpagi SepuyaAlex DimitrovKevin KillianScott HugWayne KoestenbaumEd Halter, Cooper Union Occupiers, Stephen Motika, Carlos Motta, Adam Fitzgerald, Jennifer Tamayo, Juliana Huxtable, Clark Stoeckley, Buzz Slutzky, Bruce Hainley, Justin AllenYulan Grant, and Brandon Owen of BAD GRAMMAR zine, Felix Bernstein and Gabe HootPenny ArcadeLaurie WeeksEileen Myles, Ted Kerr, and Tim Trace Peterson. What a line-up!

 

Other ways you can support the Bureau

If you prefer not to donate online you can mail a check to the address listed below. Please note that checks must be made payable to Fractured Atlas, listing Bureau of General Services—Queer Division in the memo line.

BGSQD

c/o Cage

83A Hester St.

NY, NY 10002 

There are many other ways you can help this campaign succeed in addition to donating. You can spread the word about the Bureau and our fundraising campaign both online and in real time and space. Please let people know why this project is important to you and share the link to this page:

http://igg.me/at/bgsqd/x/3855206

Please visit the store, come to our events, and bring friends to the Bureau at Cage: 83A Hester St. betweeen Orchard and Allen. Take the F to East Broadway or the B or D to Grand St.

If you can donate some time to distribute flyers to queer venues and events, we would greatly appreciate it. If you have other ideas of how you might help please don't be shy.

Thank you for your support--in whatever form it may take!!!

 

 

 

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Choose your Perk

Clerk

$10 USD
Bureau will publicly thank you for your donation on our website!
23 claimed

Apparatchik

$25 USD
One BGSQD tote bag
Estimated Shipping
November 2013
58 claimed

Administrator

$50 USD
Future Perfect, the book, to be published by the Bureau and Publication Studio this fall, edited by Andrew Durbin. Many poets, authors, and artists are contributing their work to make this an exciting collection. Check out our website for more details about the many contributors.
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
27 claimed

Commissioner (Cessna)

$75 USD
1 of 6 8 x 10” Photographs by Walt Cessna
Estimated Shipping
October 2013
5 out of 6 of claimed

Commissioner (Lanzillotto)

$75 USD
Annie Rachele Lanzillotto's L Is for Lion: An Italian Bronx Butch Freedom Memoir (SUNY, 2013), hardcover and Annie Rachele Lanzillotto's Schistsong (Bordighera Press, 2013) paperback
Estimated Shipping
November 2013
0 out of 3 of claimed

Attaché (Typaldos)

$150 USD
Print by Nickolaus Typaldos Untitled (Armani), 2013 Ed. Of 25. Signed and numbered Double-Printed Archival Inkjet Print
Estimated Shipping
October 2013
1 out of 3 of claimed

Attaché (Rosen)

$150 USD
Kay Rosen tote bag for Visual AIDS (AIDS ON GOING GOING ON), 2013 and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
1 out of 10 of claimed

Senior Supervisor (Brozgol)

$350 USD
Ceramic plate by Lee Brozgol Phallicware and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Mandarin (Hart)

$500 USD
1 Untitled plate by Thomas Engel Hart collage on glass, 17" and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Mandarin (Killian)

$500 USD
Photograph by Kevin Killian from his "Tagged" series. Killian will contact donors who select this perk and send you links to available photographs and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 4 of claimed

Mandarin (Gordon)

$500 USD
Collage by Sam Gordon Celluloid Sweepings (for Jack Smith), 2011 Silver leaf, spray paint, acrylic medium, sweepings on paper (series of 5 unique works) 10.5 x 7.5" and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Mandarin (Exum)

$500 USD
Photograph by Alesia Exum, “Joshua and Daddy” Folsom Street Fair, 1999 Archival Pigment Print image size 20 x 13 inches and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Mandarin (Diana)

$500 USD
1 of 5 drawings by Mike Diana (4 are 8 ½ x 11”, 1 is 11 x 14 including mat) and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 5 of claimed

Mandarin (Krach)

$500 USD
Photograph by Aaron Krach, TORSO, 2012, 5 from an edition 25 10” x 7”, framed, accompanied by the artist’s book, TORSO. and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
1 out of 5 of claimed

Secretary (Motta)

$1,000 USD
Print by Carlos Motta, Deviations to Love # 7, 8 x 10” archival pigment print A/P Courtesy of the artist and Y Gallery, NY and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Secretary (Rand)

$1,000 USD
Photograph by Bryson Rand Eddie (Brooklyn, NY) Archival Inkjet Print 13x19 in. 2011 and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Secretary (Krone)

$1,000 USD
Work by Larry Krone "Love is in the Air (Sunset on San Francisco Bay and the Pacific. Exposition of Golden West in Foreground)" 2007 Ink on printed postcard 3 1/2 x 5 1/2" (includes “Certificate of Authenticity”) courtesy of the artist and Pierogi Gallery and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Minister (Peter)

$2,000 USD
Drawing by Gio Black Peter, Cry Baby, 2012 Acrylic, Oil pastel, pencil on archival paper. 8.5" x11" and Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed

Minister (Koestenbaum)

$2,000 USD
Painting by Wayne Koestenbaum F. Twice oil, black gesso, and white pencil on wood panel 16 x 20 inches 2013 Future Perfect, the book (see above)
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
0 out of 1 of claimed
sold out

Manager (Quispe)

$100 USD
Estimated Shipping
December 2013
3 out of 3 of claimed

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