The Boy Is Beautiful, Issue 5

On the surface of a red-figure Attica vase, some thousands years ago, an inscription reading “ο Παῖς Καλός” had been engraved. Translating as The Boy Is Beautiful this intricate detail transforms a common vessel into a declaration of homoerotic affection; echoing the sexual liberation of a bygone era.

The Boy Is Beautiful is a biannual magazine but also an invitation to unravel the thread of queer Greek chronicles, from myth and history, to contemporary life. It’s a quest to figure out what happened between the time of Zeus and Ganymede, Apollo and Hyacinth, Achilles and Patroclus, the Band of Thebes and the Lesbian Sappho, Harmodius and Aristogeiton and my fascist, sexist, homophobic school mates, Thursdays’ straightwashed history lessons and Symposium-less Plato.

In this issue:

The Boy Is Beautiful returns for its fifth and most mouthwatering issue yet. Heterotopias journeys through the queer spaces we build to survive, seduce, worship, disappear, and become. Bursting at the seams across a whopping 228 pages, the volume drifts through orgiastic rituals, architectural fantasies, nudist beaches, activist networks, dark rooms, drag stages, poetry, cruising grounds, cyberspace and sun-struck islands.

Inside, our cover photographer Spyros Rennt moves through Berlin warehouses and Aegean dawns; legendary East London drag deity A Man To Pet reflects on twenty years of spectacle and community-building; and René Habermacher stages his Odyssey in original Versace couture. Elsewhere, Prishita Maheswhari-Alpin explores India’s contemporary kink culture in Beyond the Karma Sutra, Kleanthis Kyriakou drags up architectural education through Queer School of Thought, and Theodore, the designer behind the cult brand Intellectual Leisure, shows us around the temple of Kavla. Lucas LaRochelle maps queer memory through Queering The Map, Domhnall Nolan discusses designing spaces and furniture for pleasure, while curator Davy Pitoors reflects on the burgeoning queer art scene through Queeriosities. Newcomer hawtie Alexandros, photographed by Dario Laureano, leads a sun-drenched pilgrimage through the gay pantheon of islands – Mykonos, while Ilias Sapountzakis traces the history of Greece’s hottest nudist destinations. Smutty reader confessions collide with the feverish artworks of Berlin duo Greif Lazic, alongside queer poetry, Dionysian rites, cruising beaches, activist histories, sex goddesses, and enough sweat, seawater, poppers, tears, lube, and techno to fog the windows of Olympus itself.

Featuring photography by Nick Knight, Mara Desypris, Angelos, and many more, Issue #5, Heterotopias, asks what becomes possible when queer people carve worlds of their own – ecstatic, filthy, tender, fleeting… and yet defiantly eternal.

228pp / Softcover / Section Sewn binding for long-lasting sessions