Vegan homophobic attack?

A photo exhibit documenting the 1990 Montreal police beating of gay partygoers (Sexgararge by Linda Dawn Hammond) has been attacked--in a grassroots, collectively run vegan restaurant, of all places. "It was vandalized and taken down because of its gay content. I've pressed charges," says Hammond.

Last month, her exhibit Hot July, which also included photos of the Oka crisis, opened at Restaurant Les Vivres on Ste-Dominique. On August 6, Hammond found her Sexgarage photos "in a box under twigs and dirt--water got in the frames and damaged my prints. There was a potato mixed in. It was ludicrous." There were also some illegible words scrawled in black marker across one work. The Oka photos were left untouched. Allegedly, the man who vandalized the photos provides organic produce to the restaurant.

An anonymous member of the Les Vivres collective commented: "We are supposed to be collectively run--unfortunately some decisions are made without the collective's consent. Marie-Pierre [Michaud, the resto's founder] wasn't against taking the exhibit down, but she regrets what happened." Michaud was out of town and unavailable for comment. "I'm calling for a boycott of the restaurant," says Hammond. "It was an attack on the gay community and nobody has apologized or even explained anything to me." The exhibit can now be seen exclusively on the Web at www.iprimus.ca/~dawnone (click on "whirrled news"). :

--Genevieve Paiement

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