LONESOME TOWN
Lonesome Town is a critique of gun culture in the United States, particularly as it manifests amongst young white men. Drawing on the visual language of advertising and homoerotic imagery, the work intentionally adopts a satirical tone and seductive aesthetic to examine the entanglement of firearms with white masculinity and identity. The polished, intimate scenes are not meant to glorify, but to show how the gun is not just held but embraced.
This relationship is not incidental. As theorized by scholars such as Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment) and Richard Slotkin (Gunfighter Nation), gun ownership in the U.S. has always been bound up with fantasies of conquest, autonomy, and racial dominance. In this context, gun ownership becomes more than a right but a performance of control, a shield against vulnerability, and a claim to belonging in a nation built on violence and exclusion. The work confronts how whiteness and weaponry continue to shape American identity.
The eroticism of white masculinity is nothing new, nor is a woman’s cheeky commentary on it. The movie American Psycho amongst other works have long offered satirical takes on this dynamic. But in today’s landscape—saturated with male podcasters and “red pill” content—such media is increasingly misread as aspirational rather than critical. This ongoing misinterpretation underscores the urgency of revisiting and recontextualizing these portrayals. Lonesome Town contributes to this discourse by challenging viewers to question what is being eroticized, and why.
The series includes a video from which the acid etchings are produced. Email bailey.keogh@gmail.com to request a link to view the video work.
